Book Review – ‘Of Closets and Skeletons and other Crime Stories’

The short stories had different ways of narration which we see in full fledged crime novels. Some were not a typical whodunit but offered a mirror to the society. For example, there was a story in which we understand the daily happenings in a police station and the process of postmortem. There was another which was narrated from the pov of a fake alibi supplier.

As the narration of each story varied, the collection didn’t feel monotonous. The plot is well crafted, crisp and had the elements of intrigue and suspense. The dash of humour at the right timing perfectly complemented them. I was happy to see that in some stories female cops took the lead in crime investigations whereas in traditional crime novels very few investigations are spear headed by a woman in the police force. In this novels, Women cleverly found loop holes and even convinced the criminal to confess to their crimes. 

I have to admit that it was difficult to predict the end of the stories. Just when you have over complicated the plot in your mind, the story ends on a more obvious note. It is really difficult to condense the facts of a crime story in a matter of few pages and at the same time keep the reader on toes. The author has done a commendable job in doing that.

I liked the stories ‘Demons’ and ‘Rockabye’. The former gave a peek into the nitty gritty of the human mind and in the latter one, a cop cleverly finds loop holes in the confession of the suspect. But my favourite was ‘Of Closets and Skeletons’ which had varied themes like homosexuality, domestic abuse and religious extremism. 

‘Of Closets and Skeletons and other crime stories’ by Kaivalya Ramnath dwells into the dark underbelly of the society where people from all walks of life had malicious intent and sinister motives.