An exotic, vivid and humorous historical murder mystery
Bewertet mit 4.5 Sternen
1919: The First World War and the Spanish Flu have left Captain Sam Wyndham without a reason to live in Britain and his wish for a transfer to India is granted: In hot and sticky Calcutta his first case is already waiting for him: a high ranking member of the British colonial administration was murdered. A note in his mouth tells the British to leave India – or else...
Together with the Indian police officer „Surrender Not“ Banerjee, Sam tries to solve the case while the rising tensions between Indians and British put additional pressure on him.
„A Rising Man“ is Abir Mukherjee's debut and it likely is my first historical murder mystery. I instantly liked Sam Wyndham and his side-kick Surrender Not. Wyndham never overcame the death of his wife and he turned to opium as a consequence. However, he is not a mentally broken detective. He has a great sense of humour with lots of irony which had me often smile while reading. Sam is open-minded which makes him different to many of his fellow countrymen and that's why he and Surrender-Not make one of the best detective pairs I've read about.
Abir Mukherjee lets India and especially Calcutta come alive through his writing. It's so vivid, you can almost feel the heat and picture the street in front of you. This is my first book taking place in India and you learn a lot about the history of the country and especially of the time portrayed in the novel.
What I really missed in the book though was a glossary. Indian words are used quite frequently and some are essential to the story. I don't want to look up words on the Internet while reading....
The murder mystery is rather solid and the detective work reminded me of modern times: questioning of suspects, autopsy reports and so on. At times it was not as suspenseful as I had hoped.
„A rising man“ was an interesting read but not one that couldn't stop me reading because it was particularly gripping. I would love to continue with the Sam Wyndham series, however, and I can recommend it to anyone interested in a good story with a bit of humour.
4.5 stars.