Time for another round of Bookshelf Traveling in Insane Times which is being hosted by Judith at Reader in the Wilderness. The idea is to share one of your neglected bookshelves or perhaps a new pile of books.
Judith mentioned M.M. Kaye’s mysteries recently and that sent me to my India bookshelf. In the early days of HBO, coverage included Wimbledon and my family subscribed because we were big tennis fans. HBO also aired its first miniseries, The Far Pavilions, based on Kaye’s 1978 novel and starring Ben Cross, Amy Irving, and Omar Sharif (when I checked the cast, I saw there is talk of a remake). The cinematography would have made it worth watching even if the story and acting hadn’t been very compelling! The next day I went to the library to get a copy of the book, set in the 19th century Raj about a young Englishman born in India but raised in England; when he returns to India as an officer he falls in love with an Indian princess and struggles with cultural divides. Kaye also wrote a well-reviewed three-book memoir, beginning with The Sun in the Morning (1990) about her childhood in India. One critic wrote, "No romance in the novels of M.M. Kaye... could equal her love for India." Shadow of the Moon, one of her other historicals, is just as good or better than The Far Pavilions, however.
