Reviews

The Satapur Moonstone by Sujata Massey

fidoe's review against another edition

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2.0

Week 42 Book 67
The Satapur Moonstone by Sujata Massey
Rating: 2/5

This is the second installment in the Perveen Mistry series. Perveen is the protagonist, a Parsi woman, Mumbai's first female lawyer, in 1920s. She is estranged from her husband and lives with parents and practices law with her Barrister father. She specialises in solving cases that include women in parda, who cannot communicate with men.

The first book, called Murder in Malabar hill was decent. But this second book is excruciatingly slow with a convoluted storyline.

Satapur Moonstone is about the royal family of Satapur, where the men in line for the throne keep mysteriously dying and the women are left with little kids to protect. The Kolhapur British agent is ruling the state in the interim and everyone is concerned for the safety of the family and the future of the kingdom. Enter Perveen Mistry who is asked to meet the queens, understand their situation, and recommend the best plan for the way forward.

On her trip to Satapur Perveen meets many people and has many new experiences and learns a lot about Indian and British politics. While the setting and description are great and the basic premise interesting, the slow pace of the book and the confusing storyline make it a frustrating read. I did not enjoy this and would recommend skipping it.

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winter_pine's review against another edition

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mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

ghostlibrary's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional mysterious fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot

4.0

leonorekoki's review against another edition

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adventurous informative mysterious slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

carodonahue's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional inspiring mysterious medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

csw_1981's review against another edition

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3.75

Fun mystery set in an unusual , unusual for mysteries that is, era and culture. The main character has enough detail and back story to make the “plucky female heroine striving to be liberated ahead of her time” trope believable. 

dr_manuela_reads's review against another edition

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4.0

Was not as good as the first. Enjoyed it.

deservingporcupine's review against another edition

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4.0

I really enjoyed how uncomfortable this book felt. It was interesting to see Perveen far from her support system and trying to make it all work. This book was comfortably slow for me at the beginning, and everything started happening in a pretty satisfying way. I appreciate how the complex political system of colonized India was explained through the story. I think the mystery again took a backseat to the history and characters, which I didn’t mind at all.

wanderingbookwormsf's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional informative tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.0

chaifanatic18's review against another edition

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adventurous hopeful mysterious medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0