Asoka's Alibi

Asoka is the tallest elephant in captivity, and only Quorn, an ex-taxi-driver from Philadelphia, can manage him. In the princely state of Narada, close to Rajputana, carnival month is the one time of year the town lets itself go mad, and palace intrigue in the Ranee's household, the old art of Thuggee and a Ranee who disappears all end up depending on an elephant nobody else dares to handle. Mundy knew India and wrote adventure with the politics left in. Fifty-seven plates of painting by David Roberts and Adolf Chwala, from Cairo streets to Dublin Bay, supply the eastern and maritime scenery this tale of an Indian carnival and an unmanageable elephant demands.