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The Rozabal Line

Shawn Haigins
Lulu.com (2007)
ISBN 9781430327547
Reviewed by Narayan Radhakrishnan for RebeccasReads (1/09)

The Indian Writing in English subgenre of English literature is well known and well respected across the world. Authors like Salman Rushdie, Arundhati Roy and Vikram Seth have won accolades worldwide and international fame.  But popular fiction writing (read as mysteries and thrillers) in English by Indian authors still finds little recognition across the globe, and for that matter even within India. As a connoisseur of mysteries and thrillers, I had recently researched into the origin and development of this rather unknown subgenre within Indian Writing in English.  Though contributions in this subgenre have been sporadic and far between, there have occasionally been some gems, some diamonds which warrant mention, attention and recognition across the globe.
           
The book under review, “The Rozabal Line,” is one such novel. Self-published through Lulu by Ashwin Sanghi under the pseudonym (and anagram) Shawn Haigins in 2007, the novel was later picked up by Westland, and the book republished in the author’s own name in 2008. To put it mildly, the novel is stunning… absolutely stunning.

There is a little known tomb in Kashmir by name Rozabal. History proclaims that the tomb contains the mortal remains of a saint by name Yuz Asaf. But who exactly was Yuz Asaf, who supposedly died in 112 AD?  Father Vincent Sinclair had heard about the absurd myth of Lord Jesus Christ coming to India. But he, as like majority of the Vatican had dismissed the theory as hogwash.  But something is disturbing Father Sinclair. He is unwittingly sucked into the vortex of Rozabal in the form of dreams...in the form of haunts from his previous life. Slowly the good father begins to suspect that there is more to this myth of Lord Christ’s life in Kashmir than what is accepted by the Vatican. Was Saint Yuz Asaf Jesus himself?  Did Jesus Christ visit India during the so-called missing years of his life (between age 12 and 30)? Did he study Buddhism in India, and finally, did Jesus Christ die in India? With a cast of colorful characters and settings, including the Vatican, Opus Dei, Karma, reincarnation and racing across Rome to United States and from Kerala to Kashmir (within India), the novel is a fast paced nail-biting read.

The life of Christ in India has been the subject matter of many a non-fiction book, but fiction books on the subject are few. Save for the 70’s novel “The Thomas Document” by Hugh Gantzer, I don’t think there has been any other novel that has exploited this theme.  Of course, comparison with DaVinci Code is inevitable, and of course we have to thank Dan Brown for putting the theological thriller up the map, but unlike Dan Brown, the author doesn’t restrict himself into creating merely a conspiracy thriller.  The author proudly proclaims this as intriguing historical fiction, no more, no less.
           
A well researched historical novel, I for one hopes that this will revolutionize Mystery and Thriller Writing in English in India.

  

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