“A melancholy cop’s obsessions are just the tip of the iceberg as he leads a two-fisted team determined to clean up Mumbai’s mean streets . . . Kumar’s style, blunt but often by turns poetic and droll, is arresting . . . As unusual as it is compelling, this entry lays the groundwork for an entertaining series.”
—Kirkus Reviews

V. Sanjay Kumar has been named the winner of the 2018 Bridport Prize for Short Story!

“Kumar evokes [Mumbai] with lyrical prose.”
—Publishers Weekly

Included in a Publishers Weekly feature on Crime Fiction focused on police corruption and brutality

“[A] gripping thriller . . . Kumar has created some thoroughly intriguing characters . . . but the most fascinating of Kumar’s characters is Mumbai itself—enormous, crowded, hyperactive, roiling, stunningly rich and grindingly poor, and teeming with almost unfathomable energy. International-crime fans should flock to this one.”
—Booklist

“The Third Squad ends with an emotional wallop, making it stand out among crime novels. It has the chiaroscuro effects of classic noir, but also the philosophical depth of highbrow literary fiction . . . Mumbai teems with lurid intrigue in this smart and affecting work of postmodern noir.”
—Shelf Awareness, starred review

“Kumar does a masterful job building the story’s tension level as Karan draws closer and closer to his final confrontation with his superiors in the Indian Police Service.”
—Book Chase

“The Third Squad enveloped me in Mumbai, in its strangeness even to people who call it home. Each of the many odd but totally real characters who populate this book shines a light on the city and on one another. It’s a page-turner, but as I got closer to the end I slowed down because I didn’t want to have to leave this world.”
—S.J. Rozan, author (as Sam Cabot) of Skin of the Wolf

“Against a backdrop of debilitating poverty, ancient religion, staggering wealth, and corruption, Mumbai comes alive in The Third Squad as the perfect storm for twenty-first-century noir. Driving this absolutely compelling tale is Karan, a police sharpshooter who is essentially a trained assassin. Initially distanced from his own actions by both Asperger’s syndrome and Old World devotion to authority, he’s ultimately forced to reconcile personal morality with obedience in a grim new age of blind opportunism.”
—Tim McLoughlin, author of Heart of the Old Country