Life Etc Etc

Plot: Perry Mason receives an unexpected call from Ellen Adair, a lady of queenly bearing with a dark past. Ellen was a beauty contestant who suddenly disappeared at the height of her fame. Now, there's a tabloid which is planning to run an inside scoop on what might have happened to her. Ellen wants Mason's help in ensuring that none of the details of her colorful past come out into the open and her identity remains a secret. Despite not receiving satisfactory answers to his preliminary questions, Mason agrees to help out his new client and promptly shuts down the newspaper from running the article. But the matter doesn't end there, the newspaper sends a detective to negotiate a fee with Mason for his client's compliance. Mason immediately senses that there's more to the matter than what's being laid on the table. With the assistance of Paul Drake, his trusted detective aide, Mason finds out that a very powerful family from the same town as Ellen Adair is desp...

I guess it was destiny that the 150th post of Life Etc Etc had to be about Shri Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj. Shivaji rose like a phoenix from humble beginnings in the 17th century and laid the foundation for the Maratha empire which changed the course of  history. The history I studied at school restricted his life and achievements to a single chapter and quite erroneously credited the British Rule with the decline of the Mughal empire. I found out later on that it was in fact the Marathas under the able leadership of Shivaji who hastened the Mughal empire's downfall. They were the preeminent power whom the British had to checkmate in order to wrest control of the Indian subcontinent. Despite such monumental achievements my history syllabi had very little information about Shivaji. It was therefore a no-brainer for me to pick up this book and discover for myself why the history of India would never be complete without the mention of Shivaji.  In order to understand any histori...