Six Suspects

By: Vikas Swarup

Narrated by: Lyndam Gregory

Seven years ago, Vivek Rai murdered Ruby Gill in a restaurant in New Delhi because she refused to serve him a drink. Now Vivek Rai is dead, killed at a party he had thrown to celebrate his acquittal. Six of the guests are discovered with guns in their possession and are taken in for questioning. Who are these six, and what were they doing that night?

In this elaborate mystery, we join Arun Advani, investigative journalist, as the lives of the six unravel: a corrupt bureaucrat, an American tourist infatuated with an Indian actress, a stone-age tribesman on a quest to discover a sacred stone, a Bollywood sex symbol with a guilty secret, a mobile-phone thief who dreams big, and an ambitious politician prepared to stoop low. Each is equally likely to have pulled the trigger.

©2009 Vikas Swarup (P)2009 BBC Audio

Critic reviews

"The author of Q&A (2005), the novel that became the film Slumdog Millionaire, returns with an equally high-concept tale that uses a murder investigation to launch a riotous tour of contemporary India...a teeming, beguiling Indian panorama wrapped in a clever whodunit." ( Kirkus Reviews)
"A fizzy romp seems to be the main thing he has in mind. Oddly enough, that ambition turns this formulaic-sounding book into a refreshing oddity. It bears no resemblance to any of the cookie-cutter genre books of this season." ( The New York Times)

Great story

Loved this book! Very interesting and entertaining. Love how the author entertwines all the suspects.

Interesting book but horrible narration

Funny and engaging story, but I have never, ever, heard a worse southern accent. It is so bad that it makes the otherwise good book painful. Think Ted Kennedy and Forrest Gump, with British emphasis thrown in. I cannot believe that this made it through even a cursory edit - these are not small subtle errors but entire nerve-grating sections with bizarre distortions. If you are sensitive to poor narration, think very carefully about listening to this.

Six Suspects

Very entertaining, funny at times and interesting.
I really enjoyed the book.
Had me going til the end

An Enjoyable Read

This book was a lot of fun. It kept me guessing throughout. I don't recommend this book for people who are fans of mysteries but not fans of Indian literature.

My biggest complaint is regarding one of the six suspects. The character is cartoonish and absurd, if likeable.

The narrator is very good with most of the voices. It's a treat to hear him prounounce the names of characters and places.

Fresh and engaging, but ya gotta be in the mood

This is a very unique approach to the "who done it," with quirky, Indian cultural sensibility and a great deal of commentary on Indian life between the lines, if you are listening. Excellent dialects with subtle variation for all but the Americans, with the worst Texas accent in the history of the spoken word. It started a bit slow for me, until I got into the rhythm of the story development, but I ultimately enjoyed the book a great deal. The length proved not to be too much, as I had originally thought. It was necessary to fully develop all the subplots.