Not for this man the heady heights of Detective Inspector – instead, Kamil has been promoted to cook at the Tandoori Knights (TK) restaurant. And to be fair, he is getting pretty good at it, too, although his friend (and fellow sleuth in the previous book) Anjoli wouldn’t dream of giving him any praise for his culinary efforts. She’s in charge at TK while her parents are back in India, caring for a sick relative.
While the parents are away, Anjoli has taken the opportunity to bring the restaurant into the 21st century, and with a smart new decor and some nifty marketing tricks up her sleeve, she is beginning to attract younger, wealthier customers. All she needs is a reliable chef, and when Kamil gets a whiff of a murder, he’s off once again in pursuit of the perp.
The victim is student nurse Salma Ali, and Kamil and his new friend Naila find her body after calling around to drop off the phone she left while picking up a takeaway at the restaurant. Naila is also a student nurse at St Thomas’ and when the police seem stumped, Kamil, Naila and Anjoli decide to investigate – the Three Duskyteers are determined to get to the bottom of things.
Meanwhile, two homeless people known to Kamil and Anjoli die suddenly and Anjoli becomes suspicious. Unfortunately, no one else will listen when she says someone is killing them, not even Kamil, who is concentrating on taking his investigation – and relationship with Naila – to the next level.
It isn’t surprising for the situation to become confusing because there are so many things in the air in this book that it is hard to keep up. Unlike his previous work, The Waiter, the action here is all based in London – no flashbacks to life in India, which made Chowdhury’s debut so enjoyable and gave the narrative extra spice and subtle changes of pace.
Another unique attraction of the book is the many references made to food, which many readers will find fascinating. Unusually for a book called The Cook, this time the culinary scenes are few and far in between, leaving some readers feeling a little short changed.
There are some important messages in The Cook, among them is the fact that the plight of the homeless is so often swept under the carpet and ignored. London’s meaner streets are well portrayed, the contrasts between the haves and the have-nots revealed with a blunt realism that should make us ponder and take notice. That mirror on social injustice is one of the positives of this book.
There’s much to enjoy in The Cook, a sizzler of a crime novel that is full of spices and authentic flavour, but you’d do well to take this one with a pinch of salt at times, though.
