ASKING QUESTIONS

Welcome to India, the workaday, middle-class India in which a slightly bemused and timid Inspector Ghote persistently asks questions and solves crimes. In his narrative voice, Green sounds exactly as one expects a veteran of Her Majesty's service in India to sound. He's also perfectly at home in the dialect that most of the characters speak. This reviewer is not sure if this is a dialect of English spoken in India or an attempt to echo the rhythm and structure of some native language. Either way, the effect of local color is at once strong but unforced. A large part of the text is subtle verbal fencing between Ghote and other characters. These dialogues are consistently vivid and effortless to listen to. One has from the beginning of this audiobook the sense of hearing a rather idiosyncratic text taken perfectly in stride and given the voice the author intended. J.N. ©AudioFile, Portland, Maine [Published: OCT 97]