Book review: Bombay Swastika by Braham Singh

             Bombay Swastika                  

Author: Braham Singh

Publisher: Om books International 

Publication date: 4 Sep 2017

Language: English 

Book Length: 400

ISBN-10: 9384625574

ISBN-13: 978-9384625573

Price: Rs.295 only (as printed on the book)

About the author:

As Chief Product Officer of a global telecommunications company, BRAHAM SINGH writes extensively on IT and telecommunications. Shifting gears, he now gives us Bombay Swastika, his first novel. He also wrote the screenplay for Emperor, a political thriller set in Malaysia and based around their May 1969 race riots. Emperor, the novel, is near completion. He recently began research on his third novel, The Little Eunuch, set in China. He divides his time between Virginia and Hong Kong.

[Author Braham Singh ]

Blurb:

Bombay Swastika swings from a Nazi Berlin gearing up for its Final Solution, to 1964 Bombay, where Ernst Steiger, a German Jew, accidentally finds himself caught up in the murder of a young tribal, killed amidst allegations of something being stolen from a secure American compound. With the monsoons laying siege on the city, the reader accompanies Ernst past Bombay’s refugee camps and haunted whorehouses; food shortages, textbook mafias, communist protests against American PL 480 Food Aid, and peculiar happenings at India’s nuclear facility; where Dr. Homi J. Bhabha, the nation’s atomic mastermind, gets drawn into a conspiracy hatched in his absence.

This one-of-a-kind thriller unfolds through the eyes of a motley cast-Salim Ali, the South Indian, Muslim engineer and committed Marxist; Bhairavi, the enigmatic and sensual refugee girl; Sethji, the dowry messiah; Tsering Tufan-Homi Bhabha’s Smiling Buddha-dying from radiation exposure; and Andhi Ma, the blind mendicant who sees what we can’t.

Bombay Swastika is an exploration of the dark world of absolute truths.

My Verdict: 

Wonder detail has been put into plotting 1964 Mumbai, and India, which I found informative. Bombay then, was a melting pot of cultural uncertainty, characterised by the surviving fragments of British rule, poverty, instability and strong emotions. All this whilst India was grappling with the remnants of war with China. Historical references thrown in keep the interest of the reader and reveal the intense research behind the novel. The whole book played out like a thriller movie in my mind. The historical details are carved very well in the story. 
Really a impressive debut novel.
This novel is like no others. Braham Singh has done a wonderful job. I think every single one should read this.

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