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	Mohrbooks Literary Agency Annelie Geissler
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Crime & mystery fiction

A WILL TO KILL

R.V. Raman

First in the Harith Athreya series, this Agatha Christie-esque whodunit is set in India.

MIST, MOUNTAINS, AND MURDER: two conflicting wills. Which one comes into force depends on how Bhaskar Fernandez dies. An aging and wheelchair-bound Bhaskar Fernandez has finally reclaimed his family property after a bitter legal battle, and now wants to reunite his aggrieved relatives. So, he invites them to his remote Greybrooke Manor in the misty Nilgiris - a mansion that has played host to several sudden deaths; a colonial edifice that stands alone in a valley that is said to be haunted by the ghost of an Englishman. But Bhaskar has other, more practical problems to deal with. He knows that his guests expect to gain by his death, and to safeguard himself against violence, he writes two conflicting wills. Which one of them comes into force will depend on how he dies. Into this tinderbox, he brings Harith Athreya, a seasoned investigator. When a landslide occurs, temporarily isolating them and resulting in a murder, Athreya finds that murder is not the only thing the mist conceals. A WILL TO KILL is the first Harith Athreya mystery from an international master of the form. R.V. Raman is the author of the Inspector Ranade and Inspector Dhruvi thrillers, published in India, which are loosely based on his corporate career spanning three decades and four continents. After a corporate career spanning three decades and four continents, RV Raman has moved away from full time roles to pursue his interest in teaching and writing. He now teaches business strategy at an IIM, mentor young entrepreneurs, advise select clients and write. In an earlier avatar, he led KPMG's Consulting Practice, and was a partner with A.T. Kearney and Arthur Andersen. He writes crime fiction set in India. The first four books are about white-collar crime and murder in corporate India. The fifth is a domestic whodunit.

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Book Published 2020-10-01 by Polis / Agora

Comments

"There are so many ways to kill," observes a character in RV Raman's A WILL TO KILL, a modern-day take on the classic locked-room murder mystery, transported to a remote mansion high in the hills of southern India. Athreya is a fine detective with a curious mind, a cool eye for the chance detail, a skill in synthesizing disparate threads and a talent for resisting the insults of the requisite police officer assigned to the case. Read more...

A deftly executed country house mystery. The ghost-ridden misty landscape of the Nilgiris is an ideal setting for a cozy winter afternoon read.

Channeling Agatha Christie isn't a bad way for a writer to spend his time, not if he does it well. Raman does it splendidly...delivering a full-blast Christie mystery set in India but full of classic Christie tropes.

The influence of Agatha Christie on the author's writing is unmissable. Enjoy a nostalgic trip back to your teenage years when crisp crime thrillers kept us awake for long nights.

Intriguing contemporary whodunit and series launch... fans of golden age mysteries will look forward to the sequel.

In this kickoff to a new series, Raman brilliantly evokes Agatha Christie's classic country estate mysteries for modern-day India. It's an ingenious plot, and Raman takes obvious delight in teasing out the suspense to great effect.

Reminiscent of Agatha Christie mysteries, a sure hit for readers who love a taste of foreign intrigue and a solid whodunit. Fans of Ngaio Marsh's A Man Lay Dead and Patricia Moyes's Dead Men Don't Ski will enjoy.

UK: Pushkin-Vertigo ; Japanese: Sogensha

The influence of Agatha Christie and John Dickson Carr on the narrative is compelling... The narrative style also shows influences of author Ngaio Marsh. Like Marsh, Raman's prose is what really makes him stand out.