# The Mendonҫa Mystery and Other Stories

- Link: https://writersworkshopindia.com/2015/07/20/the-mendon%d2%aba-mystery-and-other-stories/
- Published: 2015-07-20T21:38:16+00:00
- Author: admin

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**Author:** Michael Chacko Daniels
 **Illustrators:** Krittika Ramanujan and Aaron
Bass **Pages:** 212 **Year of Publication:** 2014 **Price:** Rs 400 / $25 **ISBN:**
978-93-5045-068-0 (9789350450680)

_**About the Author**_
 Michael Chacko Daniels is a former community worker and 
clown who grew up in Mumbai. **Writers Workshop**, India, has published four of 
his books: _**Split in Two**_ (poetry, 2004), _**Anything Out of Place Is Dirt**_(
novel, 2004), _**That Damn Romantic Fool**_ (novel, 2005) and _**Morning in Santiniketan**_(
haiku, 2010). He worked as a publisher and editor for several years with the New
River Free Press of Grand Rapids, Michigan, and as an assistant editor with The 
Asia Foundation, San Francisco. As a community worker, he has been actively involved
in a variety of areas including the Jobs for Homeless Consortium of Alameda County
which he helped establish in 1988.Daniels is an alumnus of St. Michael’s High School,
Wilson College, University of Bombay (Department of Economics) and Northwestern 
University’s Medill School of Journalism. He is based in San Francisco.

_**About the Illustrators**_

**Aaron Bass** is a studio artist who primarily works in printmaking media. He studied
printmaking at the California College of Arts and Crafts, Tyler School of Art and
Tamarind Institute and has an MFA from the University of New Mexico. At present,
he lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico, with his wife Krittika Ramanujan, son Simon
and assorted quadrupeds. He teaches at the Studio Arts department at the Southwest
University of Visual Arts.

** Krittika Ramanujan** studied painting at Indiana University, Bloomington, and
received an MFA in printmaking from the University of New Mexico. She has had solo
shows featuring three ongoing bodies of work: Dante’s Divine Comedy, mammal skeletons(
Coterminus) and human rights and lynching (Ghost Puppets).

_**Teaser**_
 In her introduction to the book, Naomi Rose writes:

“By way of introduction to _**The Mendonҫa Mystery and Other Stories**_, let me 
say that I’m not certain who is the more fortunate here – me or you.

Me, because I got to edit the seventeen magical, often poignant, often humourous
stories in this book.

You, on the other hand – on the threshold of reading… You are in for some unexpected
adventures at close and memorable range.

There are family stories where the unlikely occurs not only in what takes place 
but also because how the author tells them opens up fresh new pathways in our reading
experience…

There are finding-your-place-in-the-world stories (with the attendant difficulties
that can come of that quest to remain oneself and still belong to a new world)…

There are tall tales… and barely exaggerated tales filled with modern urban pathos…

There are sweet and poignant testaments to youthful fancies, embarrassments, and
unexpected compassion…

And there is the sheer poetry of haikus in the context of atmospherically drawn 
moments…”

_**Contents**_
 Introduction / 11 1. The Mendonҫa Mystery / 13 2. Three Dozen Mangoes
for Mr. Diefenbaker / 25 3. The Confirmed Bachelor of the Bombay YMCA / 35 4. Zach
Runs from a Great Man / 55 5. The Cat Who Drove the Ghost Away / 87 6. Naga in the
Negev / 97 7. The Makeover of the Son of Cochin Cohn / 107 8. Sing an Indian Name/
133 9. Grandma and the Old Warrior / 139 10. Mudka-Potka Gobble Village Chic / 155
11. Life, the 27 Bryant Version / 163 12. Riders of Dragon Number 19 / 171 13. Touch
Me? Vaya Con Dios Inbound on the 22 Fillmore! / 179 14. Shadows of Spread Wings /
197 15. Fruit for the Gods / 201 16. Where the Clear Creek Narrows / 203 17. Finding
Memories in the Library on a Rainy Day / 207