This is one novel which will make sense only if you plan to sit through it and not give up midway. And there are many reasons why you could end up being frustrated with this story. There is just too much of beating about the bush, not getting to the point, building up the central character. And the basic premise of the plot is not all that clear. It’s about The People versus The Others.
And how the former (involving police and intelligence agencies around the world) try to subvert and take over the lives of the latter (the poor and the homeless, the refugees and the downtrodden).Tasneem (Taz) Dharwalla, a down-and-out broadcast journalist gets a letter from a man named Armitage Shanks, which sends her off in pursuit of the ‘story of her life’.
The novel by Mc Callum is about the journey Taz undertakes to uncover the truth behind the letter written by the impossibly named Armitage Shanks (actually the name of a sanitary equipment manufacturer in the UK). It takes her to back-of-beyond destinations in Europe and Africa, before the denouement in India.
A gripping read, atleast after the first 50 pages, the novel makes you sit up and think twice about all that you took for granted. The highest police, civil authorities and the media – all hand in glove for what seems to me a reprehensible rationale. Anyway, it makes for a roller-coaster ride, as you travel with Taz and face the ghosts of her childhood, her drinking problem and her down-in-the-dumps career, and come out on the other side in a good enough condition.
