Tag: Hanchette Uk

The Unexpected Inheritance of Inspector Chopra by Vaseem Khan – the first in a series of mysteries, Mumbai and a baby elephant

March 9, 2024

The Unexpected Inheritance of Inspector Chopra by Vaseem Khan

This is the first book in a very popular series, and I can see why. Having read two of Khan’s other books in the Malabar House series which is set in a different time I wondered what this other series would be like. I am glad to say I have found another series to read! I really enjoyed this well written novel with its excellent plot, surprises and vivid character. This novel is set in near contemporary Mumbai, a place I know very little about, but in this book, I discovered a significant amount about this fast-growing city and some of its issues as well as the people who populate it. This is a city of mobile phones alongside terrible poverty, of high-rise buildings and auto rickshaws, of police officers who are very varied. This book features a man, Inspector Chopra, who is coming to terms with retirement from a job he relished in so many ways, an influential and well recognised police officer with an impressive reputation for methodical detection and fairness. His wife Poppy is a sparky character in her own right who deeply loves her husband and is baffled by his actions. The unique element of this book is a baby elephant who turns up out of the blue and subtly makes an unexpected contribution. There is so much to enjoy in this book, and I am so pleased to have discovered it.

The book opens on the day of Chopra’s retirement. It is against his wishes as a heart problem has led to him having to face early retirement when he has been fulfilled in so may ways by the role. He is told of his unusual inheritance on the way to the office, but in the sadness of his final day at the police station after twenty years his mind is distracted. Another unexpected matter is the discovery of a young man’s body and its casual dismissal by the other officers. The boy’s mother makes an appeal that he finds difficult to ignore or forget; he resolves to discover more. The presence of a small and evidently sick elephant is another unusual problem – when there is a complaint by a self-righteous fellow resident Poppy loyally supports her husband, even though she does not understand his interest.

As the newly retired Chopra tries to make a new life for himself, he finds himself irresistibly drawn back to the fate of the young man, especially when he discovers there is significant damage to the body. He uses his old contacts, and old title, to gain more information and start an investigation that will take him to some strange places in many ways. Meanwhile he realises that his mysterious elephant needs help, especially in an unforeseen crisis. Poppy is also struggling to come to terms with her new situation, a sadness that she cannot escape, and a growing suspicion that her beloved husband has secrets.

There is a gentle humour that runs throughout this book, which is difficult to explain, but which lifts it from a crime thriller along with a wonderful creation of characters, even those who only play a small part in the overall plot. There is a real depth to this novel, as Chopra moves around a fast-growing Mumbai, entering the well off areas as well as those places where even the police cannot go easily, where poverty, desperation and crime have shaped lives. This is a city where new buildings are next to open sewers, where people’s lives can be seen as valueless, and others are deeply ambitious. I discovered so much in this well paced and satisfying book, and I am keen to discover more about Chopra, Poppy and the new addition to the family, Baby Ganesh.

The Midnight News by Jo Baker – a novel of a young woman in upheaval in 1940 and the London Blitz

September 6, 2023

The Midnight News by Jo Baker

This is a powerful and intense novel set in the London Blitz of the Second World War. It is enthralling, atmospheric and a little disturbing. It is narrated mainly through the point of view of Charlotte Richmond, a twenty-year-old woman with a disturbed past in 1940, when she has made a break for relative freedom in a city that is rapidly becoming accustomed to nightly bombing which is a total upheaval for many of the people left, a profound upheaval mirrored in the mind of Charlotte. As a reader I found this an unsettling, brilliantly written book, which often made me stop and admire the power of the writing.

Early in the novel the first raid is likened to an unexpected sound on the streets of London. “She can also hear a waterfall, and there are no waterfalls round here.” Charlotte does not tell her own story, but it follows her progress, her confusion and bafflement of what is happening. It explores the nature of friendship, of life experience, of contrasting family situations. Charlotte’s silent thoughts, of how despite a relatively wealthy background she is forced to count out her money that she earns for “essential war work”, is revealing of how she really lives. She finds a welcome in a boarding house, in sharp contrast to a background she has rejected, which may have rejected her. When a tragedy rocks her life, when she finds her whole view of life upset by how what is happening to everyone seems particularly awful for her, she feels threatened on every front. Her thoughts become dominated by her friends in several ways, even her remarkable godmother seems unusually preoccupied. Her typing job seems pointless, despite her being told that every piece of information is vital.

In a London being reformed on a nightly basis, where nothing is certain, Charlotte becomes convinced that she is being watched, pursued from and by a shadow man. Terrified of what is happening around her, to her, she makes decisions, attempts to make connections, but is left distressed. The only hope seems to be with a young man who she sees feeding the birds, a habit which is frowned on in a time of increasing food shortages. Tom’s gentle, non-threatening actions provide an alternative for Charlotte as she desperately seeks to silence the voices, the disturbance she feels. Tom is the only other character given his own story in the book; hesitant but supported by his family, challenged in many ways, permanently wondering.

This is a novel that twists and turns, with surprises at every turn, with challenges for every character, with real pain on many levels. It contains so many ideas, of the nature of family, of friends, of the truth in a time of upheaval in so many ways. For me it had echoes of Sarah Waters’ “Nightwatch”, where expectations are overturned, where desperate young women try to exist in a world completely changed overnight. This is a painfully honest book, with a strong inner dynamic of a disturbed and disturbing character and surprising twists and turns throughout. I really recommend it as an enthralling and significant novel of women’s experiences of the Second World War in all the messiness and unpredictability.