The Strange Disappearance of a Bollywood Star: A Baby Ganesh Agency Investigation

Khan’s offbeat third mystery featuring retired Indian police inspector turned Mumbai PI Ashwin Chopra (after 2016’s The Perplexing Theft of the Jewel in the Crown) takes on Bollywood. At the start of the book, Chopra, his wife, and his sidekick—a baby elephant named Ganesha—attend a concert featuring Vikram “Vicky” Verma, “enfant terrible of Bollywood, and superstar in the making.” The performance is punctuated by several magical disappearances and reappearances by Verma, though Chopra suspects that the Verma he saw last wasn’t the same person who began the show. That becomes more significant when Verma’s mother, Bijli, who was once a leading movie star, reveals that Verma is missing. While she doesn’t suspect foul play, Bijli fears that her son will be blacklisted if he doesn’t complete his work on his current film, the most expensive in Indian history, and hires Chopra to find him. The path to the truth contains some comic scenes that readers with a taste for broad humor will appreciate. (July)