Inspector Ghote's First Case
H.R.F. Keating
Minotaur, Aug 18 2009, $24.99
ISBN: 9780312384043
In 1960 to celebrate his promotion to Detection of Crime Branch Inspector, Ganesh Ghote and his pregnant wife Protima plan to see Olivier’s Hamlet. However, before they leave for the movie, his new superior Assistant Commissioner Divekar directs him to visit Sir Rustam Engineer ASAP. Sir Engineer is a legend as the first Indian to become Commissioner of the Bombay Police, but has since retired.
Sir Engineer asks Inspector Ghote to investigate the death of the pregnant wife of a friend. Retired civil engineer Robert Dawkins refuses to believe his Iris would kill herself especially carrying their child. Ghote reluctantly leaves his spouse behind, a sort of harbinger of things to come in "future" investigations, as he travels to Mahableshwar. There his inquiry is stonewalled by servants who refused to speak and by his schoolboy classmate Inspector Pathan “Bullybhoy" Barrani.
Returning to a beloved inspector for the first time in about a decade, H.R.F. Keating provides a super first case prequel that enables readers to solve the case before the hero. However Ghote's sympathy and compassion surface early on and the profound look back at the convoluted Indian-British relationships makes for a great police procedural. Fans will relish the return of Inspector Ghote and Protima as they wait the birth of their first child, Miss Hamlet, and ponder to tell or not to tell that is the question.
Harriet Klausner
No comments:
Post a Comment