We read The Widows of Malabar Hill together this summer in the Modern Mrs Darcy Book Club and discussed with author Sujata Massey. She talked to us about her first mystery series, set in Japan, that she wrote during her time there.

From the publisher: India, 1922: It is rainy season in the lush, remote Sahyadri mountains, where the princely state of Satapur is tucked away. A curse seems to have fallen upon Satapur's royal family, whose maharaja died of a sudden illness shortly before his teenage son was struck down in a tragic hunting accident. The state is now ruled by an agent of the British Raj on behalf of Satapur's two maharanis, the dowager queen and her daughter-in-law. The royal ladies are in a dispute over the education of the young crown prince, and a lawyer's counsel is required. However, the maharanis live in purdah and do not speak to men. Just one person can help them: Perveen Mistry, Bombay's only female lawyer. Perveen is determined to bring peace to the royal house and make a sound recommendation for the young prince's future, but she arrives to find that the Satapur palace is full of cold-blooded power plays and ancient vendettas. Too late, she realizes she has walked into a trap. But whose? And how can she protect the royal children from the palace’s deadly curse?"

If you've read The Widows of Malabar Hill from the Summer Reading Guide, you might want to check out this collection of novellas by Sujata Massey, including a prequel about Perveen Mistry. The set contains Outnumbered at Oxford, the story of Perveen's Oxford days, caught in a case involving a stolen mathematics proof. The collection also includes stories The Ayah's Tale, a class story set in British Colonial India; Bitter Tea, involving a fifteen-year old trapped in a remote village taken over by religious fundamentalists; and the title story, India Gray, following a Bengali woman volunteering at a World War II hospital.