Tabish Khair
A subversive, macabre novel of a young Indian manâ€™s misadventures in Victorian London as the city is racked by a series of murders.,In a small Bihari village, Captain William T. Meadows finds just the man to further his phrenological research back home: Amir Ali, confessed member of the infamous Thugee cult. With tales of a murderous youth redeemed, Ali gains passage to England, his villainously shaped skull there to be studied. Only Ali knows just how embroidered his story is, so when a killer begins depriving Londonâ€™s underclass of their heads, suspicion naturally falls on the â€œthug.â€ With help from fellow immigrants led by a shrewd Punjabi woman, Ali journeys deep into a hostile city in an attempt to save himself and end the gruesome murders.,Ranging from skull-lined mansions to underground tunnels a ghostly people call home, ,The Thing about Thugs, is a feat of imagination to rival Wilkie Collins or Michael Chabon. Short-listed for the 2010 Man Asian Literary Prize, this sly Victorian role reversal marks the arrival of a compelling new Indian novelist to North America.
Fiction,Historical,Historical Fiction,Mystery,Cultural,India,Asian Literature,Indian Literature,European Literature,British Literature,Historical,Historical,Victorian,Cultural,Asia,Literature,19th Century
The Thing about Thugs