About The Book
In 1891, a horrified British public learnt that Sherlock Holmes - in a last deadly struggle with the archcriminal Professor Moriarty - had perished at the Reichenbach Falls in Switzerland. Two years later, popular Demand made Conan Doyle resurrect the great detective. Holmes informs a stunned Dr Watson : 'I travelled for two years in Tibet, therefore, and amused myself by visiting Lhasa.'
This is all that the World has known of Sherlock Holmes' journey to the East. Jamyang Norbu - an avid reader of Kipling and Doyle - decides to take the matter in his hands; to investigate Holmes' stay in Lhasa, Tibet. What he unearths is the Mandala, written by a wily Bengali scholar, Hurrie Chunder Mookerjee, Holmes' travelling companion. The Mandala holds the key to the mystery and reveals Holmes in a Landscape so fascinating, a Game so intriguing that it is difficult to resist.
An exciting, often richly humorous Detective story The Mandala of Sherlock Holmes also evokes the Romance of Kipling's India.
Winner of the Crossword Book Award for Fiction 2000
About the Author
Jamyang Norbu is director of the Amnye Machen Institute, Tibetan Centre for Advanced Studies, Dharamsala. He is the author of Warriors of Tibet, the Biography of a Kampa warrior; Illusion and Reality, a collection of his Political essays, and the Editor of The Performing Traditions of Tibet. He was also the director of the Tibetan Institute of the Performing Arts and has written five plays and a traditional Opera libretto.
Norbu has lectured on Tibetan culture and the freedom struggle at more than a hundred universities and Institutions in the USA, Canada, Australia, France, India, Japan and the UK. He has also appeared on a number of televisions and Radio shows and interviews all over the World to argue the case of Tibet.
Contents
Preface
Introduction
I. India :
1. The Mysterious Norwegian
2. The Red Horror
3. Sherlock Holmes Reminisces
4. Flora and Fauna
5. The Brass Elephant
6. A Shot in the Dark
7. The Frontier Mail
8. Under the Deodars
9. A Pukka Villain
II. THIBET :
1. More Bundobast
2. On the Hindustan-Thibet Road
3. A Dam'-Tight Place
4. Passport to Thibet
5. On the Roof of the World
6. The City of the Gods
7. Tea at the Jewel Park
III. AND BEYOND :
1. The Flying Swords
2. The Missing Mandala
3. The Dark One
4. To the Trans-Himalayas
5. The Ice Temple of Shambala
6. Opening of the WISDOM Eye
7. His Last Bow
Review
'Jamyang Norbu is renowned as one of the best Tibetan writers at work today, principally on account of his polemic essays. In The Mandala of Sherlock Holmes he has produced a scintillating, learned and extremely skillful work of fiction, revealing the secret of Holmes "missing" years in India and Tibet. Read this, and your view of the great detective will never be the same again.' - Patrick French, Author of Younghusband and Liberty or Death
". . .He has turned out a flawless and hugely enjoyable novel in the very best of Holmesian tradition. . .a cracking good read right from the start." - Kanika Datta in Biblio
"The Mandala. . .is a peep into the life of a brilliant sleuth. . .it's a tribute. . .the creation of a skilled and driven craftsman. . .a must read for those who have never heard of Sherlock Holmes." - Dhiraj Singh in The Hindustan Times
"Norbu's style is racy yet elegant, measured yet breathless. . .Mandala is like meeting an old friend after many years. He seems altered by time, yet he seems the same as we knew him a long time ago." - Soumya Bhattacharya in The Telegraph, Calcutta
"In an era where abstract writing has become de rigeur, Norbu's simple tale stands out elegant and entertaining." - Deccan Herald, Bangalore
"Norbu's piece of literary sleight-of hand constitutes a master-stroke. Norbu writes well and there is no denying the authenticity of his research." - Ivan Mendes in The Times of India Sunday Review