What happens when you take a Victorian drawing room murder mystery and change the location? You’ll be pleasently suprised by the answer: THE PALACE TIGER, part of Barbara Cleverly’s Joe Sandilands series. He’s a Scotland Yard detective training the police force in India, but every once in a while, his duties call for him to do a little outside investigating.
His supervisor, Sir George Jardine, is worried about the current maharaja of Ranipur. It seems he has not long to live and George sends Joe to make sure the heirs will stick with the British government. George has every reason to be worried, as the first heir to the throne dies mysteriously, having had the habit of declawing and sewing shut the mouth of a panther so he could wrestle with it. But recently someone changed the beast out for one not as hindered.
On his travels to the home of the maharaja, Joe meets Madeline, the wife of the second heir, Prithvi. She being an American whom Prithvi met overseas, this has caused major problems within the family; since Prithvi does not want to take a second wife, his offspring can never rule. As they travel, Madeline explains to Joe how she and her brother – both pilots – were just taken with Prithvi. The travelers see a plane performing acrobatics in the air, all assuming it’s Madeline’s brother. Tragicially, the plane crashes, and the pilot turns out to be not her brother, but her husband.
Now Joe is asked to look into this crime and to look after the third heir, a 12-year-old. With this novel, Cleverly does not take the simple route. She writes a complex plot, throwing suspect after suspect into the light. You assume it has to be one person – in fact, you’re so sure of it – just to have the rug (Indian, of course) pulled out from under you. Then she mixes it up with another unexplained murder. Cleverly has really done her research into this era of India, showing a world most people have never known. For those who enjoy a nice, little mannered whodunit, you will be in heaven, as Cleverly reminds you of a certain other female author from the UK who wrote a few mysteries in her time. –Bruce Grossman
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