TEHRAN – Qatreh, a major Tehran-based publisher, has released a Persian translation of “The Last Kashmiri Rose” by British author Barbara Cleverly.

Alireza Durandish is the translator of the book originally published in 2001.

In a land of saffron sunsets and blazing summer heat, an Englishwoman has been found dead, her wrists slit, her body floating in a bathtub of blood and water. But is it suicide or murder? 

The case falls to Scotland Yard inspector Joe Sandilands, who survived the horror of the Western Front and has endured six sultry months in English-ruled Calcutta. 

Sandilands is ordered to investigate, and soon discovers that there have been other mysterious deaths, hearkening sinister ties to the present case.

Now, as the sovereignty of Britain is in decline and an insurgent India is on the rise, Sandilands must navigate the treacherous corridors of political decorum to bring a cunning killer to justice - knowing the next victim is already marked to die.

Barbara Cleverly was born in the north of England and is a graduate of Durham University. A former teacher, she has spent her working life in Cambridgeshire and Suffolk; she now lives in Cambridge. She has one son and five step-children.

Her Joe Sandilands series of books set against the background of the British Raj was inspired by the contents of a battered old tin trunk that she found in her attic. 

Out of it spilled two centuries of memories of a family – especially a great uncle who spent a lot of time in India – whose exploits and achievements marched in time with the flowering of the British Empire.

Photo: Front cover of the Persian edition of Barbara Cleverly’s book “The Last Kashmiri Rose”.

MMS/YAW