Stories from India hold a special place in my heart. After Stealing Thunder and the waves of nostalgia that it created in me, I was on the search for an authentic Indian experience. Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line was that book for me, not just because it is set in India but also because I got the audiobook, and it was super immersive. Let’s take a quick look at the synopsis and then we’ll chat about the India of Djinn Patrol.
Three friends venture into the most dangerous corners of a sprawling Indian city to find their missing classmate.
Down market lanes crammed with too many people, dogs, and rickshaws, past stalls that smell of cardamom and sizzling oil, below a smoggy sky that doesn’t let through a single blade of sunlight, and all the way at the end of the Purple metro line lies a jumble of tin-roofed homes where nine-year-old Jai lives with his family. From his doorway, he can spot the glittering lights of the city’s fancy high-rises, and though his mother works as a maid in one, to him they seem a thousand miles away.
Jai drools outside sweet shops, watches too many reality police shows, and considers himself to be smarter than his friends Pari (though she gets the best grades) and Faiz (though Faiz has an actual job). When a classmate goes missing, Jai decides to use the crime-solving skills he has picked up from TV to find him. He asks Pari and Faiz to be his assistants, and together they draw up lists of people to interview and places to visit.
But what begins as a game turns sinister as other children start disappearing from their neighborhood. Jai, Pari, and Faiz have to confront terrified parents, an indifferent police force, and rumors of soul-snatching djinns. As the disappearances edge ever closer to home, the lives of Jai and his friends will never be the same again.
Drawing on real incidents and a spate of disappearances in metropolitan India.
Content Notes: Loved ones going missing, religious tension.
Thoughts
If your upbringing was anything like mine in the late 90s and 2000s in India, you would know the Indian fascination for crime shows. There is always some crime show on at any time of the day! It’s the best time pass ever to immerse yourself in mystery, suspense and real life stories about family, love, hate and politics. Jai is no different – he is fascinated by crime shows and wants to be a detective. When his friend goes missing, this is his chance to make a name of himself and practice true jasusi (detective) skills. I loved going on this adventure with Jai, however terrifying and close to reality it might be.
On Life as a 9 year old
Life as a 9 year old is quite boring. Waking up, going to school, studying, eating, some play and then more study and sleep. No wonder crime shows are an escape! Jai is fearless in his pursuit of the truth once his classmate goes missing. What are the police doing? Have they asked everyone they were supposed to? Can a kid learn more than the police already know? Jai is going to do his best to find out, with help from his friends!
He has grand ideas, and I loved him for that. He may be young but that doesn’t mean things escape his attention. He knows that the place to work as an undercover detective at is the tea shop where people drink tea and share gossip. The plight of his little home community does not escape him either – the terrible state of public hygiene, the way the police ignores their pleas to look for the missing kids, the religious divide in the community and the difference between boys and girls are all things he is aware of. He is also aware of superstition – the djinns that haunt parts of the city, to help those in need.
On Community
A true community stands together in bad times. Whether it is missing children or the threats from politicians and police, together, a community can face everything, share their grief and do whatever they can to build each other up.
Even where I was growing up, our neighbors were practically family. They weren’t related to us by blood, but they took care of the kids in the community when the family needed help. There were so many kids around the same age, and we would play together, our parents watching over us. The days when my friend would stay with me because her family was out were one of the best days during my childhood.
Kids unite families and you can guess how much it pains to see someone else’s child gone missing.
On the Missing Children
This book comes out of Deepa Anappara’s years of being a journalist in India and what she saw being reported in the media. The following is taken from the conversation between Random House (the publisher) and Deepa, found in the reading guide.
As many as 180 children are said to go missing in India each day. The statistics vary wildly, and this figure could be higher or lower. It is impossible not to be aware of the stories of children who disappear if you have lived in an Indian city, as I have.
Each time a shocking case of disappearance, or a cluster of disappearances, came to light, as it did when I was living in Delhi, what inevitably followed was armchair sleuthing and speculation about the motives of the perpetrators. That the police had spectacularly failed to stop these crimes, and were guilty of negligence, further fueled these conversations.
It seemed to me that the focus in the media quickly moved from the children who had disappeared, and their families who had been let down by the police, to the perpetrators, and the lurid details surrounding the crimes. As a bystander, reading or seeing snatches of these stories on the news, I was horrified that the parents and the children had been reduced to footnotes, without agency of their own.
The idea for this novel came to me because of my anger at a system that had failed the very people it was supposed to protect. My novel returns their agency to the children who are caught up in a horrific, chaotic situation. They are determined to speak for themselves, and hold onto a narrative that is spinning away from them.
Deepa Anappara in the Reading Guide for Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line
Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line does exactly that.
🎧 The Audiobook Experience
Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line is an atmospheric audiobook. The cast consists of Indira Varma (she was in Game of Thrones), Himesh Patel, and Antonio Aakeel. The noise and luster of the city are well portrayed using sound effects and I loved that Hindi was part of the speech at times, making the storytelling more grounded.
I am so glad I listened to the book in audiobook format because it truly took me back home. 🙂
I loved this book! What an amazing job at showcasing the important issue of children gone missing! In a time when politics and gains overshadows so many other issues, we need stories like this one. I hope that you will give it a chance. 🙂
** Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line is now out in stores so get a copy and let me know what you think! **
Amazon Print
Amazon Kindle
Take a look at the Reading Guide for Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line. Many thanks to the publisher for providing me a review copy via NetGalley and my wonderful local library for making the audiobook available to me.
Cover image: Photo by Campbell Boulanger on Unsplash
This sounds awesome! I’ve been listening to more audiobooks in the last two years and the best one was the most immersive — like a performance rather than just a reading.
I love how you put it and I agree – a performance rather than a reading!