Why a Booktrail?
2000s: Mumbai, murder and a baby elephant…..
The Unexpected Inheritance of Inspector Chopra (Ganesh Agency 1)
What you need to know before your trail
Inspector Ashwin Chopra is due to retire this very day from the Mumbai police department so he’s not expecting to have any more cases to solve before he goes. But then two mysteries fall right into his lap – luckily not literarily as one of them is a baby elephant. The first mystery however is a drowned little boy whose death is suspicious and who no one seems bothered to solve.
But Chopra is not having any of it, and last day or not, he’s going to get to the bottom of it. So he trawls the city of Mumbai looking for clues – with a baby elephant named Ganesh as his sidekick..
Travel Guide
Mumbai
“It was the hottest summer in Mumbai for more than twenty years. And for the second year in a row the monsoon had failed to arrive on cue. “
This is a Mumbai which is sweaty, noisy, chaotic, vibrant and teaming with a number of characters and colours:
“Auto-rickshaws buzzed through the dusty urban maze….”
This is the Mumbai of Inspector Chopra. A soon to be retired inspector with a baby elephant as a sidekick? Only in India and perfect for the culture and to evoke many of the real life sights and sounds of the city. Elephants walking down a street in Mumbai is not an uncommon sight and quite a comical one in the book when Inspector Chopra and his new sidekick Ganesh (named after the famed Indian God) meander down the busy streets. The very idea for the book came from one such moment and it was then that Ganesh and his adventures were born.
From the slums to the nice part of town
The investigation takes Chopra to both sides of the big, loud chaos that is Mumbai. He trawls the streets of the city from the city slums to the teeming town centre.
The city’s Dhavari area
The Dhavari area of the city is the slum area of the city and is where Chopra sees the poverty and “The Kala Qila area of the slum, Chopra knew, was famed for its leather shops. Leatherwork ….was one of the oldest industries in Dhavari” This is exactly where you would witness “the gaggle of sweating citizenry” evoked in the novel.
Carter Road
Carter Road is a busy place and it’s “where every comes to”. This is the posh side of town notes Chopra as the long promenade has some very nice apartments along it. Very different to the slums that’s for sure!
The novel fully immerses you into the workings of the Mumbai police force, how elephants really should be helping fight crime and soak up the evocative descriptions of busy, bustling Mumbai life.
Trail Gallery
Booktrailer Review
Susan @thebooktrailer
Well what can I say. The setting, the characters and the way in which they jump off the page – ‘the gaggle of sweating citizenry’ , or ‘Mumbai’s pavementless streets’ is just a joy to read. Chopra is an intriguing character – often melancholy and what the poor man has to put up with on his last day at work! He sniffs his food as a ritual since he has an aversion to ginger – it’s these little quirks that made me picture the man as if he was stood right beside me.
The hot humid streets make you grateful that this book is such a page turner as they provided a welcome breeze as the action ramped up and the ‘bovine press of bodies’ continued to squash the words together. It was that realistic I swear I had to wipe my brow on more than one occasion or prepare to hold my nose when Ganesh appeared on the page.
Aah Ganesh. I do love you. You make the world a better place. Chopra loves his city of Mumbai and now he has you. If you ever want a holiday though – the door of booktrail towers is always open. And there’s as much straw and elephant food as you want.
Booktrail Boarding Pass Information:
Twitter – @VaseemKhanUK Facebook – /VaseemKhanOfficial Web – vaseemkhan.com
Back to ResultsWhere Next?
