Message in a novel

Reeti Gadekar puts crime in Delhi under the microscope again in her second Nikhil Juneja novel

The Indian writing in English market was bawling for someone to take notice of the gaping hole in the section of crime fiction. In 2008, Reeti Gadekar gave the masses what they wanted with DCP Nikhil Juneja and her first novel, Families At Home. Gadekar, who now lives in Berlin with her husband, flew into the country for the launch of her latest offering, Bottom Of The Heap, a book that picks up from where DCP Nikhil Juneja was left off.

Born and brought up in Delhi, Reeti studied German in JNU before she walked out 10 years after with an M.Phil in hand and found her way to Berlin. She has lived in Germany for over a decade now, yet she chooses Delhi as the backdrop for her stage. “I am Indian, and Delhi is instinctive with crime, maybe in another 20 years I will be unable to write about the city like I can now,” she says. Gadekar has worked as a translator, librarian and a teacher before she was finally decided to be a writer. “I always loved reading, and I would say I want to write a book, but there is a difference between saying you want to write a novel and actually doing it,” says Gadekar who finally took the leap of her husband's faith in her.

Full report here Hindu

Mystery of the missing Jasoos

It all began with Holmes of course. Though Poe's Murders in the Rue Morgue (1841) can claim to have created the first detective in fiction, and Wilkie Collins' The Moonstone (1868) is regarded as the first modern detective novel, the adventures of Sherlock Holmes thrilled readers like no other. Agatha Christie's Poirot and Jane Marple, and PD James' Adam Dalgliesh followed the trail. Many decades later, these and a handful of other foreign classics — continue to fill the crime fiction racks here. No desi wannabe of The Great Detectives Club has ever managed to get a foot in the door.

It's not for want of trying. In the last couple of years, the genre of Indian crime fiction in English has seen many new titles. From Lalli of Kalpana Swaminathan's Page 3 Murders, additional sessions judge Harish Shinde in Aditya Sudharshan's A Nice Quiet Holiday and ACP Nikhil Juneja in Reeti Gadekar's Families at Home, to Shashi Warrier's Anna Khan in Sniper, the Indian jasoos is begging for a break. Ravi Singh, Penguin India editor-in-chief, says, "Compared to the near drought in previous years, there are now more crime and thriller writers, but the number is still small. And very few of them sell good numbers. Kalpana and Mukul Deva have been the notable successes in recent years."

Full report here Times of India