A woman detective Sonia Samarth, her cat Nidhi, and her assistant Jatin, a small detective agency in Pune – Stellar Investigations, all add up to some very interesting mystery reading. What makes Manjiri Prabhu’s works interesting however, and takes it away from just being another mystery novel, is that Sonia Samarth is also an astrologer and uses her knowledge of astrology to solve mysteries.
Creations of Manjiri Prabhu are very light and a great quick-read and it’s no surprise her second novel is being published in July 2006, perfect as a summer holiday book. Manjiri Prabhu, whose first mystery “The Cosmic Clues” was published in October 2004, is an animal welfare activist. She lives and writes from Pune, India.
In her second mystery, “The Astral Alibi”, Sonia Samarth sets out solving yet another collection of mysteries and crimes in the city of Pune. As she gets entangled in solving mysteries, she peruses the horoscopes of the suspects and victims and uses her celestial knowledge to find out factors and occurrences about characters that even they do not know sometimes. Prabhu’s book reflects life in contemporary India and also has some pleasant touches of humor and romance. However, there is something missing in Prabhu’s books, that oomph behind a mystery that’s leaves you biting your nails and dying to know what’s happening in the next page…
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