A 1920s Bangalore mystery with a dose of politics | Review of ‘A Nest of Vipers’ by Harini Nagendra

A Nest of Vipers by Harini Nagendra: A historical mystery set in 1920s Bangalore with political unrest and intriguing crime.

The year is 1922. Edward, the Prince of Wales, is mid-way through a rather disastrous tour of India, encountering a country where murmurs of discontent have escalated into a full-blown non-cooperation movement after the Jallianwala Bagh massacre.

His next stop is Bangalore, home to the irrepressible Kaveri Murthy, the protagonist of A Nest of Vipers, the third book in Harini Nagendra’s ‘Bangalore Detectives Club’ series. In these already-turbulent times arrives the Maximilian Circus, filled with people who make their living off illusion, trickery and acrobatics, a perfect setting for lies, intrigue and murder. And Kaveri, not surprisingly, finds herself deeply embroiled in both the political unrest and crime, right from the get-go. 

The book opens inside a circus tent. Kaveri and her husband, Ramu, who have managed to get first-class seats to the performance, are invited backstage by master magician Das and his son, Suman. After a somewhat disconcerting conversation, they go back to their seats and begin watching the show, only for it to come to an abrupt halt under a set of strange circumstances, which include a missing magician, masked robbers, and a dead man.

Into this mayhem plunges Kaveri, accompanied by her motley crew of associates, which include her (sometimes disapproving, but mostly supportive) husband, her lonely neighbour Uma Aunty, a string of street urchins (accompanied by Kasturi, the cow, a fearsome kicker) and a former prostitute named Mala.

Where A Nest of Vipers shines, really shines, is in how it brings to life the Bangalore of the 1920s, a city about which Harini writes with love and a fair bit of nostalgia, buttressed by facts. That, when coupled with a fun bunch of characters (both human and animal), vivid descriptions, wry humour and an intriguing mystery, makes it a delightful afternoon read (especially if accompanied by snacks and masala chai). 

But unlike the first two parts of the series, A Nest of Vipers doesn’t fit quite as comfortably into the cosy mystery genre. There is simply too much going on with the book constantly veering into political and social commentary, hampering its pace: not always ideal in a whodunit.

And while I love the way Nagendra intersperses the narrative with descriptions of food, taking me back to a childhood spent longing for the potted-meat sandwiches, eclairs, bacon and scones of Blyton’s young investigators, I wish she had avoided italicising the names of dishes such as nimbehannu chitranna, menthi hittu majjige, kosambari and uppittu. This is also the case with other commonly-used Indian words like akka, kalari, jujubes and lathis: the linguistic gatekeeping ends up feeding too much into the ‘exotic Indian’ stereotype.