Tarquin Hall is a writer and journalist who has lived and worked in much of South Asia, the Middle East, Africa and the US. He is the author of Mercenaries, Missionaries and Misfits: Adventures of an Under-age Journalist; To the Elephant Graveyard; and Salaam Brick Lane: A Year in the New East End. He is married to the journalist Anu Anand and lives in Delhi and London.
The most original detective in years. Picture Hercule Poirot with an Indian accent, eating chili pakoras and riding in an auto rickshaw. Tarquin Hall has captured India in a way few Western writers have managed since Kipling. India's humor, commotion and vibrancy bursts from every page, exposing its vast, labyrinthine underbelly. Scintillating! -- Tahir Shah, author of The Caliph's House A brilliantly written humorous tale that vividly captures the sounds, smells and foibles of modern India -- Ayub Khan Din, writer of East is East Lively and quick-paced ... What Cara Black does for Paris, Hall achieves for India * Kirkus * Tubby, ingenious and hilarious, Delhi's most trusted PI, Vish Puri, is not easily forgotten. Properly disdainful of unoriginal crime-busters like Sherlock Holmes and James Bond, his unique methods of detection deserve to be widely known and feted -- David Davidar, author of The Solitude of Emperors Entertaining . . . Hall combines an insider's insight with the eclectic eye of a good foreign correspondent . . . The very opposite of the exoticism of which this kind of fiction is often accused. Instead of escaping into another world , western readers are encouraged to see an unflattering reflection of their own values and desires * Financial Times *