Vaseem Khan's The Dying Day: A Novel from the Malabar House Series

Kindle Customer: The complexity of the characters, the evolving mysteries embedded in historical themes and literary study make for wonderful reading. Looking forward to the next book!

United States on Sep 16, 2023

Patto: Persis Wadis has been called prickly, arrogant, charmless — all true. But how else can she survive as the lone female police inspector in Bombay? She’s also a fast shot and an aggressive fighter, a good thing, since she’s attacked more than once in this book.

Persis has two difficult cases — the theft of a priceless 600-year-old manuscript of Dante’s Divine Comedy, and the gruesome murder of an unidentified white woman.

The man who stole the manuscript was a renowned Dante scholar. Not only did he steal it but he’s left a trail of clues in the form of riddles, ciphers, and puzzles — as if he wanted the police to find it! Why? What was his game? Persis, beset by lying witnesses and enemies in disguise, struggles stubbornly to solve one riddle after another.

I really enjoy Vaseem Khan’s writing style, peppered with apt metaphors and lively turns of phrase. And I admire how adroitly he enriches his storyline with historic facts and ambiance. Two years after Independence, reforms are stalled and ongoing protests and strikes are clogging the city's arteries. Historic Bombay comes alive in these pages.

United States on Sep 04, 2023

jhbandcats: I’m so frustrated with this series. I love the stories and the main character Persis and learning about post-Independence India, but so much of the writing drives me nuts. At least the jarring introduction of historical facts into the tale didn’t bother me as much this time.

That said, the whole premise of the riddles seemed preposterous. Maybe if the riddles had been less complex I might have accepted them more easily, but I couldn’t picture a frantic, stressed police inspector going through the nitpicking of figuring them out - and there were a LOT. The story itself was too complex, with too many extraneous characters muddying the plot, especially at the end when everything is finally spelled out.

I was also bothered about documents being faxed - I didn’t know faxes existed in 1950s. In fact, they didn’t. They weren’t in use till 1964. Perhaps the author was referring to the pantelegraph, a precursor to the fax machine.

And what’s that bit about casually climbing over a 7’ wall in the middle of the night? Doesn’t seem realistic.

Finally, there’s a scene in a morgue where what appears to be a tattoo is discovered, but it turns out...

United States on Aug 28, 2023

Tone the Cone: A great storyline mainly a voyage of discovery through riddles left to find the manuscript The Divine Comedy. The murders start racking up as the discoveries are made. Brilliant!
Much better than the first in this series.

United Kingdom on Jun 14, 2023

Prairie Pal: Those who wish to spend time with detective fiction's least likeable detective, the Zoroastrian female sleuth Persis Wadia, will find much to enjoy in this iteration of the Malabar House series. If readers also want to hear ad nauseam about the sins of British imperialism in India, that will be an added bonus. Otherwise this book has little exciting to offer. I shall not be purchasing any more of Mr Khan's predictable products.

Canada on Jun 14, 2023

Graham of Watton: 'The Dying Day' is the second book by Vaseem Khan in the Malabar House series, in which the main character is Inspector Persis Wadia, India's first female detective (it's not essential to have previously read 'Midnight at Malabar House', the first book in the series, but would be helpful).
The main strength of this book is the plot: it's an exciting tale of derring-do involving a missing ancient document, Nazi villains and complicated riddles. But it's also a missed opportunity: although the author created a good sense of time and place in 'Midnight at Malabar House', these elements are somewhat lacking here. But this drawback won't stop me buying the next book in the series by this excellent writer.

United Kingdom on Oct 07, 2022

Amitabha Sanyal: Good

India on Jul 09, 2022

Boingboing: In this second of the series featuring female police officer Persis Wadia, the writer and his characters seem to have settled into their skins nicely. It's more assured than the first book with a lot less ranting about prejudice and a lot more getting on with the sleuthing.

A British academic has gone missing with a priceless copy of Dante's Divine Comedy. He's left a trail of cryptic breadcrumbs for Persis and Archie to follow in rather a classical style. Readers are unlikely to know enough about the cultural references to solve the mystery themselves, but the clues are still satisfying. Meanwhile, Persis is second string on a murder mystery for a beautiful young woman found dead on a railway line. Could the two crimes be connected? Let's see.

There's more action and less explaining which is a good thing. The odd thing is that when we finally work out what's going on, it's soon apparent that the setting in Bombay is a bit irrelevant to the crime and the motivations - which is rather a pity. For a protagonist who dislikes the old Empire ways and the influence of the British, the plot relies a lot on institutes and systems set up by them.

None of this distracts...

United Kingdom on May 03, 2022

Serena: While Inspector Persis, the star of this novel, could not have existed as she does in this book in India in 1950 we women of the 21st century like to believe she did. It is fiction, after all, and the author's last very charming mystery series was about an almost magical baby elephant that assisted in murder investigations. The author, Vaseem Khan, is writing this new much more serious and historical series which asks us again to enjoy stretching our imaginations.

In The Dying Day Inspector Persis is asked to investigate two mysteries that appear unrelated. The case of solving the stolen ancient manuscript is fascinating and complicated. Inspector Persis' chip on her shoulder- angry personality is relieved occasionally by her loving father and her resistance to having romantic feelings for a white British forensic specialist who always appears when she needs him. She doesn't like most of the people she works with--especially the Inspector she feels betrayed her by giving newspaper interviews about an earlier case. Eventually, we see a bit of hope that Persis isn't all crusty corners and might develop a bit of understanding and empathy for limited others.

This book is...

United States on Nov 14, 2021