Midnight at Malabar House

"We’re in Bombay on New Year’s Eve 1949. As newly independent India celebrates the start of the new decade, Inspector Persis Wadia is consigned to the midnight shift in the basement of Malabar House. After six months on the force, she remains India’s only female police detective and — facing both overt and more subtle prejudice — is part of the city’s unit of mistrusted and sidelined officers. When she gets the call about the murder of a prominent English diplomat at his own New Year’s party, she is determined to solve the case, never mind all the feathers she has to ruffle by offending the powerful guests. This is a cracking mystery with an Agatha Christie -esque denouement, as well as an excellent historical novel set in the aftermath of partition. This book, which won the Crime Writers’ Association ‘s historical dagger award, is the first in the Malabar House series."