Bombay's Away!, 3 May 2004

By	Donald Mitchell "a Practical Optimist" (Boston) - See all my reviews

The book opens as Inspector Ghote and his wife, Protima, are flying to Calcutta. Protima has unexpectedly inherited an estate from a distant relative. She remembers the house and land fondly from her youth, and is determined to move to Calcutta so that the Ghotes can retire there on her inheritance. Having come from Calcutta originally, she rhapsodizes about the many wonders of Calcutta. Everything is better or bigger there than anywhere else.

This sets up a nice tension, because Inspector Ghote loves his native Bombay and his police work there. He has no interest in moving to Calcutta, but doesn't want to spoil his wife's joy.

Upon arrival, they decide to visit the house on their own before the appointed trip planned with the estate's lawyer. What they find is a rundown mess filled with immigrant squatters. While there, they meet the next-door neighbor who bewails the fact that Protima's relative had been unwilling to sell while the property still had some value.

But no matter! Protima decides that she will oust the squatters, repair the house, and move in. When the lawyer arrives, he tries to talk her out of that . . . and mentions that he has a buyer for the property. But why would anyone want to buy it? During the conversation, the lawyer contradicts what the neighbor has said about Protima's relative not wanting to sell. That puts Inspector Ghote on his guard. Soon he finds more contradictions, especially when the lawyer tries to avoid advancing any money from the estate to Protima.

Deeply annoyed that someone may be trying to hoodwink his wife, Inspector Ghote finds himself working at cross-purposes to his own desire to return to Bombay as he unravels the mystery.

With such a fine set-up, you would expect there to be a wonderful mystery. Actually, the mystery isn't very mysterious. The detection is also pretty simple. That would be all right, but the story development is mostly about endless visits to Calcutta tourist spots, descriptions of the superiority of Calcutta over all other cities, and endless attempts by those in Calcutta to obtain bribes.

Mr. Keating's purpose in the book seems to be to write a morality tale about the dangers that even petty bribery can bring. Everyone in the book finds it more practical to pay bribes from time to time to get some short-term advantage than to play by the rules. When you do that, you become tarred by corruption and inevitably are harmed.

But the book doesn't quite work. Instead, the story's apparent lesson seems to be that if Inspector Ghote had avoided investigating, all would have been much better. That seems to suggest that sticking your head in the sand is the best policy when you spot something fishy, even if you are a police official.

The book also portrays the potential for pervasive corruption on a scale that cannot be stopped. That just wasn't credible to me, even though I know little about modern India.

I listened to the audio tapes of this book, which are read by the author, Mr. H.R.F. Keating. I enjoyed the sound of his voice in creating the accents of the characters. I will remember those accents with pleasure when I reread books in the series.

If you decide to read this book, think about where you may be succumbing to the temptation to cut moral boundaries in search of a momentary advantage. Do you think it's wise to continue?