Death in the Air
Ratings3
Average rating2.8
The White Lotus meets Knives Out meets Crazy Rich Asians in this devilishly entertaining debut novel. 'Crisp as a gin and tonic and delightfully wicked . . . I had to force myself not to binge it in one night.' - Kevin Kwan, author of Crazy Rich Asians Murder. It's terrible for your karma. Even worse for your holiday. Welcome to Samsara, a world-class spa nestled in the Indian Himalayas where all your wishes are only a gilded notecard away. Ro Krishna has just checked in. With his rakish charm, Oxford education, and perfect hair, he had it all – well, until he left his job under mysterious circumstances. It was super hectic, and Ro decides it's time for some much-needed R&R. At Samsara, he's free to explore the innumerable yoga classes, wellness treatments and guided meditation sessions on offer alongside the rest of the exclusive hotel's guests. Until one of the guests – gorgeous, charismatic, well-connected, like most of them – is found dead. As everyone scrambles to figure out what happened, Ro is pulled into an investigation that endangers them all and threatens to spiral beyond the hotel walls. Because it turns out it's not just heiresses and Bollywood stars-to-be that have checked in: cocktail hour is over, and death is on the prowl . . . Bursting with wit, glamour and smarts, Death in the Air is a murder mystery like no other: at once a love letter to Agatha Christie and a razor-sharp exploration of colonialism and class. 'A mystery with wit so sharp you'll get papercuts.' - Jack Heath, author of Kill Your Husbands 'Fans of The White Lotus will enjoy this entertaining resort-based murder mystery . . . an Agatha Christie-style locked-room mystery that threatens a higher body count, and doubles as a wicked satire on the foibles of the ultra-rich. Murali has written a comic crime novel that mixes elements from two popular genres into a colourful and clever detective story full of memorably eccentric characters.' - Sydney Morning Herald 'Glamourous, gripping, absolutely heaps of fun. I loved this.' - Lucy Foley, author of The Guest List 'Peppered with dark humour, charm and cleverness, Death in the Air will make you laugh, think, and struggle between bingeing it all in one go or savouring every juicy detail. This is the perfect book to read between friends, for a book club, or for one's own enjoyment!' - Readings 'a nerve-jangling good time.' - Publishers Weekly 'A fascinating genre mashup for the discerning—and reflective—mystery reader.' - Kirkus Reviews
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I have learned of books through many ways: word-of-mouth from friends, YouTube recommendations, ads in Barnes and Noble, ads on airplanes, Reddit comments, reading random articles that aren’t even about books and so on. One way I hadn’t learned of a book before was from watching a game show. That changed with this book, which I learned about because its author Ram Murali, was on Jeopardy!. He mentioned he was a writer and I liked him on the show, so I ordered the book.
The back part of the cover jacket says that this is Murali’s first novel and you can tell. He clearly has a lot of really interesting ideas but I don’t think they’re expressed in the best or most interesting way. One of the first rules of writing is ‘show, don’t tell’ and there is so much telling in this book, to the point that it detracts from my enjoyment of the story. This characteristic of Murali’s writing unfortunately bleeds into the characters as well, leading many of the supporting ones to be one-note caricatures.
With that said, I did enjoy parts of Death in the Air. The mystery itself is quite interesting and you can tell that Murali is a fan of the classics like the works of Agatha Christie in the way he drops clues. I will also give him credit for writing a really convoluted plot that does in fact make sense at the end. Murali is capable of writing a strong plot, and in a mystery novel that’s extremely important.
I will also say that it’s possible that I’m just missing things about this book. It primarily takes place in India and many issues specific to Indian culture are discussed throughout. I am not remotely familiar with many of the topics Murali talks about here and it’s likely that I would have enjoyed the book if I knew more about what Murali was talking about.
So what do you get when you have a mystery book with ok characters but an intriguing plot? You get a pretty ok whodunnit. I can’t say that I would recommend this to anyone looking for something new to read, but I do think fans of this genre will find something to like here.
I really wanted to love this. I love a locked room mystery, particularly one when people are on vacation. I enjoyed the storytelling but there was wayyyy too much detail in some scenes and then entire other scenes were skipped over.
The piece that bugged me the most: why in the world was Ro allowed to be so involved in the investigation??
Sorry, what is happening? Bizarre things happen out of the blue - so much so that I go back a few pages to see if I missed something. The comparisons to Crazy Rich Asians are a bit of a stretch - Murali describes rich clothes and name-drops exclusive labels, but that's not quite the same thing. I'll keep going to give it a fair shot, though :)
