A Cut-Like Wound by Anita Nair

Release: July 8, 2014
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Bitter Lemon Press
Source: Random Things Tours
Find it at: Goodreads, Amazon, Kindle, B&N, Kobo, TBD,

Nair writes big, brave descriptions of one brutal murder after the next, relentlessly describing each death even as sub-inspector Santosh loses his breakfast over them.”—Time Out

It’s the first day of Ramadan in heat-soaked Bangalore. A young man begins to dress: makeup, a sari, and expensive pearl earrings. Before the mirror he transforms himself into Bhuvana. She is a hijra, a transgender seeking love in the bazaars of the city.

What Bhuvana wants, she nearly gets: this elusive young woman attracts a passing young man—but someone points out that Bhuvana is no woman. For that, the interloper’s throat is cut. A case for Inspector Borei Gowda, going to seed, and at odds with those around him including his wife, his colleagues, even the informers he must deal with. More corpses and the spicy concoction includes Urmila, Gowda’s ex-flame of a mystery novel.

Most intriguing is the grim world of Bhuvana. Her chilling hijra fantasies, emotions, and hopes are there but oddly touching. Some mysteries remain till almost the end. For instance Bhuvana’s connection with the wealthy, corrupt Ravikumar is one. He is a corporator living in a mansion and controls whole districts of Bangalore.

About the Author:

Anita Nair lives in Bangalore and is a prize winning, internationally acclaimed author, playwright, essayist,
lecturer and literary personality.

Her novel Ladies Coupe, first published ten years ago, is a feminist classic published in thirty languages all over the world. The Daily Telegraph called it ‘one of the most important feminist novels to come out of India’. The movie adaptation of her previous book, Lessons in Forgetting, has just won the Indian national award for the best feature film in English language. Her another critically acclaimed novel was The Lilac House,

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A Cut-Like Wound Review:

This was a gripping tale with an eclectic cast, and I enjoyed it a lot!

Firstly, I really liked Gowda as the main character. The author balances Gowda’s personal life with the case beautifully. Gowda’s personal life is complicated while he reminisces old moments with Michael, forms a relationship with Urmila, distances from his wife, and feels his son might be a drug addict. That doesn’t stop him from trying to put his career on track as he tracks down a serial killer. The author wrote him in various layers, which made the story interesting. Similarly, the serial killer is wonderful as the negative character. I found the backstory, motives and methods for why the killer did what they did very interesting. Similarly, I enjoyed the supporting characters like Santosh and Urmila.

Moreover, the author keeps the story fresh and gripping with her style of writing. We learn who the killer is early on, but the fun is watching how far they would go in this cat and mouse game. Also, the author encompasses a bit of both worlds in the story. On one hand, the author tells the tale in a stylish westernized manner where we see detailed autopsies and thorough investigations. On the other hand, as an Indian, the story feels natives with the backdrop of Bangalore and the regional slangs in the dialogues.

However, I felt there were too many characters in the canvas at times. For instance, I did not know what Michael’s role was in the story. Also, I did not know this was the first book in a series, and did not anticipate the cliff-hanger ending. Apart that, this was very entertaining. I look forward to reading the next book. Overall, this is a very gripping Indian crime fiction novel.