Skip to main content

Top mysteries challenge review: The Murder of the Maharajah by H.R.F. Keating

In keeping with my India-oriented reading I chose a Top Mystery that takes place in that country, not long before the end of the Raj when Maharajahs still had some power (even if it was dependent on British support).

Year of publication: 1980
Genre: Mystery, cozy
Type of mystery: Murder
Type of investigator: Police officer
Setting & time: The fictitious state of Bhopore, India; 1930.

Story:
The immensely rich Maharajah of Bhopore is murdered and several people had the means, motive and opportunity (or at least two out of the three), to have done it. Due to an impending visit by the Viceroy of India, the Resident Adviser calls in District Superintendent of Police, Mr. Howard, and presses him to solve the case quickly, because if the murderer turns out later to be the heir to the throne, it isn’t good for the Viceroy to have met him. Howard sets out to methodically investigate the case, and in a reconstruction at the end makes some interesting and startling revelations.

Review:
Keating has taken the classic country house (or small village, desert island, cruise ship, etc.) mystery and set it in the exotic location of a maharajah’s palace in India, but it is in every detail still a classic “limited location - limited suspect group” whodunnit.

While the detective is a police officer, he does not have the backup of other policemen or forensics specialists, and does not interrogate people police fashion, rather using the methods of elimination and observation used by non-police detectives across the genre, so this can not be classed as a police procedural.

The writing is straightforward, with touches of humour here and there. The main characters are just barely brought out of the realm of stereotype by being given small personality quirks or distinguishing traits, but are still recognisable as reliable old types: the trusted retainer who may not be so trusty, the older woman with something to hide, the hothead, the male and female love interests, the dashing but not too bright young man, the quiet and dedicated detective, the spoilt young man suddenly forced into a position of responsibility, the mysterious woman who may have something to hide, the gold-digger, the reader stand-in, etc.

What makes this a bloody good mystery is then not the characters, but the plotting, the twists, turns, red herrings and an excellently imagined macguffin.

Now I think I will go and put the Inspector Ghote mysteries by Keating on my BookMooch wishlist. Maybe I'll be able to find some of them in India.

Rating: A very good mystery that will keep all but the most observant readers guessing until the very end. 4 stars.

Books left in challenge: 87.

Place on the list(s): CWA #97
Awards and nominations: 1980 Gold Dagger Award.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Book 40: The Martian by Andy Weir, audiobook read by Wil Wheaton

Note : This will be a general scattershot discussion about my thoughts on the book and the movie, and not a cohesive review. When movies are based on books I am interested in reading but haven't yet read, I generally wait to read the book until I have seen the movie, but when a movie is made based on a book I have already read, I try to abstain from rereading the book until I have seen the movie. The reason is simple: I am one of those people who can be reduced to near-incoherent rage when a movie severely alters the perfectly good story line of a beloved book, changes the ending beyond recognition or adds unnecessarily to the story ( The Hobbit , anyone?) without any apparent reason. I don't mind omissions of unnecessary parts so much (I did not, for example, become enraged to find Tom Bombadil missing from The Lord of the Rings ), because one expects that - movies based on books would be TV-series long if they tried to include everything, so the material must be pared down ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Icelandic folk-tale: The Devil Takes a Wife

Stories of people who have made a deal with and then beaten the devil exist all over Christendom and even in literature. Here is a typical one: O nce upon a time there were a mother and daughter who lived together. They were rich and the daughter was considered a great catch and had many suitors, but she accepted no-one and it was the opinion of many that she intended to stay celebrate and serve God, being a very devout  woman. The devil didn’t like this at all and took on the form of a young man and proposed to the girl, intending to seduce her over to his side little by little. He insinuated himself into her good graces and charmed her so thoroughly that she accepted his suit and they were betrothed and eventually married. But when the time came for him to enter the marriage bed the girl was so pure and innocent that he couldn’t go near her. He excused himself by saying that he couldn’t sleep and needed a bath in order to go to sleep. A bath was prepared for him and in he went...
Post a Comment
Read more

List love: 10 recommended stories with cross-dressing characters

This trope is almost as old as literature, what with Achilles, Hercules and Athena all cross-dressing in the Greek myths, Thor and Odin disguising themselves as women in the Norse myths, and Arjuna doing the same in the Mahabaratha. In modern times it is most common in romance novels, especially historicals in which a heroine often spends part of the book disguised as a boy, the hero sometimes falling for her while thinking she is a boy. Occasionally a hero will cross-dress, using a female disguise to avoid recognition or to gain access to someplace where he would never be able to go as a man. However, the trope isn’t just found in romances, as may be seen in the list below, in which I recommend stories with a variety of cross-dressing characters. Unfortunately I was only able to dredge up from the depths of my memory two book-length stories I had read in which men cross-dress, so this is mostly a list of women dressed as men. Ghost Riders by Sharyn McCrumb. One of the interwove...
Post a Comment
Read more