The Case of the Missing Servant by Tarquin Hall

Summary and review:

Vish Puri is the force behind India's "Most Private Investigators, Ltd.," an award-winning outfit that has solved the most baffling cases, from homicides to political intrigues to matrimonial stake-outs. Vish Puri is stout, has a carefully groomed and curled mustache, and is never to be seen without one of his tweed Sandown caps (his collection is imported from Jermyn Street in Picadilly), which pair beautifully with his new, always carefully pressed, gray safari suit. He is also clever, has stellar connections, loves disguises, and never fails to solve a case by using old-fashioned detective skills, persistence, and the art of deduction. But don't compare him to Sherlock Holmes, who, in Vish's opinion, merely copied the methods first set down thousands of years ago by Vish's guru, Chanakya, the Indian philosopher who established the art of investigation.

The Case of the Missing Servant is the first installment of what is to be a detective series by Tarquin Hall, a British journalist who has spent his career in south Asia. The case involves an honest public litigator is who is accused of murdering Mary, one of his family's servants who has mysteriously disappeared from his home. As nothing, not even Mary's last name, is known about the girl, this case stretches even Vish Puri's detective skills. At the same time, he is dealing with his overprotective "Mummy," an attempt on his life, his wife's insistence that he forgo delicious but artery-clogging Punjabi food, and a matrimonial case that is not as simple as it first appears.

Vish Puri is a great main character. More than a little sure of himself, he nevertheless seems to deserve the credit he gives himself, which makes him a sympathetic character, and his ego adds spice and humor to the novel. I loved the the nicknames given to characters in the book, Chubby, Tubelight, Facecream, and Flush. Although the plot was interesting and had a number of twists and turns, the book wasn't particularly suspenseful. I never feared for Vish or any of his compatriots, and I didn't know his client, Ajay Kasliwal, well enough to be overly concerned for what happened to him.

I've never been to India and don't know much about it, but this book makes me feel as if I've experienced it in all of its incarnations--fascinating, disturbing, colorful, raw, modern and traditional. There is an extensive glossary at the back of the book which includes words in Hinid, Punjabi, Sanskrit, and Nepali. The glossary was very interesting, and the use of the non-English words and terms definitely added to the atmosphere of the book; however it was distracting at times to have to flip to the back of the book to find a word's definition. ★★★★★★☆☆☆☆ (6/10)

Content:

Blood and Gore: There are descriptions, though not graphic, of the murder victim's body

Sex: The missing servant may have been raped, and there are several sexual innuendos throughout the book, as well as mention of adultery.

Offensive Language: There is some blasphemy and "minor" swearing in English. In addition, the Punjabi equivalent of the f-word is used and then translated in the glossary.

Nanny Returns by Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus

*Note: spoilers follow. Not any specific details, more like "meta"-spoilers that might give away the overall attitude of the book, I guess you could say. So if you're worried about that, you might not want to continue reading. Honestly though, I wouldn't suggest reading this book, so my recommendation is to read on!

Summary and review:

Private schools are the new nannying positions in this sequel to The Nanny Diaries. Nan has returned to New York City after a ten-year hiatus, in which she and her husband, "Harvard Hottie" Ryan Hutchinson, have been globe trotting in pursuit of Ryan's career with the UN. In the meantime, Nan earned a master's degree in organizational development. Back in the city, Nan is attempting to juggle the renovation of a crumbling Harlem brownstone with starting a consulting business, while dealing with an absentee husband, run-ins with old high school "friends," and her decade-old guilt over the way she left Grayer and the Xs. Oh, and her husband wants to start a family.

Only a few days back in the city, a very drunk 16-year-old Grayer shows up on Nan's doorstep. His parents have finally split, leaving him alone with a 7-year-old brother, an incapacitated mother, and a need to know why Nan left 10 years ago. Just like that, Nan is thrown back into the bizarro world of the Xs and their Upper-East-Side insanity.

From there, the plot shatters and splits off in about a thousand different directions. There's just too much going on for any one of plot lines to be fully developed, or to arrest the reader's attention and sympathy. The plot line involving Nan's self-absorbed high school acquaintances doesn't seem to add anything to the story other than providing settings for some of the action to play out. The same is true of the story line about Nan's parents possible eviction. The home remodel story fits better, but just goes way too far, until it becomes a little bit ridiculous.

The main plot lines in the story [seem] to be the Xs and Nan's position with a consultant for Jarndyce, an exclusive private school run by an absolutely toxic parental board, which puts the Xs' exploits from the first book to shame. Oh, and Nan having a baby. That's supposed to be one of the main parts of the story, but it's completely overshadowed by everything else going on. Anyway, while working for Jarndyce, Nan is put in a variety of situations that go against her beliefs, providing the perfect opportunity for Nan to stand up stick it to the scum of the East side, but instead, and here come the spoilers, she totally and completely folds in the name of remodeling her new house. The authors tried to excuse Nan's behavior by establishing that she knew the actions she was enabling were morally reprehensible. The thing is, however, that knowing right from wrong and choosing wrong anyway does not make a person any less culpable. It makes you a hypocrite and a coward.

While Nan does her best to help out the X boys, there is no "nanny-cam" moment like the one readers cheered at the conclusion of Nanny Diaries. With the exception of a short outburst to Grayer, Nan never stands up for herself or her supposedly-high morals; in fact, she is complicit in some of the worst goings-on at Jarndyce.

Equally offensive is the barrage of F-words that the reader is pelted with in this book. There are 305 pages in the copy I read, and without going back over the book in its entirety, I feel comfortable saying that the F-word is found on half of those pages, often multiple times.

All in all, I would advise most readers, even those who loved Nanny Diaries, to skip this installment in the life of Nan. ★★☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆ (2/10)

Content:

Blood and gore: N/A
Sex: multiple references to adultery, an explicit "sexting" episode, use of the F-word in a sexual context, and reference to a sexual encounter à la The Graduate. Gross.
Language: abhorrent