Paul Waters launches Delhi mystery Death at the Elephant House

UK-based author Paul Waters has launched the second book in his Indian-Irish cosy crime mystery series in London, with its India release scheduled for the following week, news agency Press Trust of India reported.

Titled 'Death At the Elephant House', the book brings back an unusual crime-solving duo — an Irish nun and a Delhi hotel owner — introduced in Waters' first novel, 'Murder in Moonlight Square'.

Waters, who is from Belfast in Northern Ireland, developed a love for India through his Delhi-born wife, Aneysha. He set his first mystery in her home city and has continued the story in the new book.

"The books have two main characters: one of them is a semi-retired Irish teaching nun called Sister Agatha Murphy of the Sisters of the Amazing Grace, nicknamed the Saggies, and her partner in crime solving Avtar Mehta — proprietor of the historic Delhi Haveli Hotel in Chandni Chowk," Waters told PTI.

In the first book, the two meet by chance while smoking behind Mehta's hotel and become involved in a case featuring the police, spies, a missing guest and a secret killer, while retaining their sense of humour.

"In book two, the world's most unlikely crime-solving duo returns to figure out a deadly locked-room mystery involving one of Delhi's richest families, a charismatic gangster, a police siege and a cigarette-stealing elephant," Waters said.

The plots and characters draw heavily from real life. Waters' Irish family has links with India through his aunt Agatha, a teaching nun who worked across the country. Considered too "feisty" to remain in Ireland, she was sent to India by her religious order and later became principal of Jesus and Mary College in Delhi.

Waters said his wife noticed that his aunt's first posting was in Pune, then known as Poona. His wife's mother and her two sisters had attended school there after their family was displaced from what is now Pakistan. "After some detective work, we realised that my auntie Agatha taught my wife's late mother," he told PTI.

"I decided that this was India or the universe giving me a push to create my Indian-Irish cosy crime mystery series set in Chandni Chowk," said Waters, an award-winning BBC journalist.

After a series of book events planned in India later in October, Waters intends to return to writing and create one book for every month of the year. The planned stories will feature aspects of Indian life such as Holi, Diwali, cricket and weddings.

His first Indian mystery was set in December in the run-up to Christmas. The latest book follows Sister Agatha and Avtar as they investigate a murder against the backdrop of Lohri bonfires in January. Waters eventually hopes to give readers around the world a year in the life of India and his fictional characters.

"It's important to me to write books that feel authentic to Indian readers. So even though my books are completely fictional, they are rooted in the reality of life and stories that I've heard from real people about their real lives," he said.

His research includes walking through Delhi's lanes, observing life over a cup of chai and talking to people over a drink. "Fiction is real life with the settings turned up. But India starts with a setting that is already more vivid, more colourful and more in your face. And by placing my stories in Chandni Chowk, I've turned the dials on every sense — taste, smell, sound, sight — up even further," he told PTI.

"India is such a busy, lively, various, changing country, with people moving at all different paces, that it surely must be the best place to set stories," Waters said.

With 'Death At the Elephant House', Waters continues the Indian-Irish mystery series inspired by his family connections with India, while planning further books that follow Sister Agatha and Avtar through different months and aspects of life in the country.

With PTI Inputs

- Ends