• Crime - English - Suspense

    The Poisoned Lassi

    August 28, 2025 - By 

    Pabandeep Singh 1 The day began with a deceptive calm as the Singh family gathered at the ancestral haveli, its sprawling courtyard decorated with marigold garlands and incense smoke curling into the late afternoon sky. The occasion was meant to be one of prayer and ritual, a havan arranged by Harjit Kaur to mark a prosperous harvest season and to offer blessings for the family’s future, but beneath the fragrance of camphor and the rhythmic chanting of the priest lay a storm of unspoken tensions. Gurpreet Singh, the eldest son, stood near the head of the courtyard, his arms crossed…

  • Crime - English

    The Music Room Murder

    August 25, 2025 - By 

    Alok Mukherjee I The Mallick mansion stood like a fading relic on one of South Kolkata’s quieter streets, its grandeur worn down by decades of neglect, yet still capable of stirring awe in those who crossed its threshold. Rajat Mallick, the current custodian of this ancestral home, walked through its corridors with a nervous air, his mind fixed on the night ahead. The music room, once the pride of his forefathers, had not seen such a gathering in years. High ceilings lined with fading frescoes, Belgian chandeliers that flickered with uneven light, and carved wooden panels heavy with dust spoke…

  • Crime - English

    Shatranj Ke Khiladi 2.0

    July 26, 2025 - By 

    Mayurakshi Sharma 1 The monsoon had painted Lucknow in sepia — wet alleys shimmering under rusted streetlights, the scent of damp earth clinging to the city’s bones. Zoya Rizvi sat on the floor of her small apartment in Hazratganj, hunched over a half-broken laptop and sipping over-steeped chai. The newsroom she once called home had shuttered six months ago; now, freelance gigs and occasional bylines were all she had to show for her stubborn honesty. She was finishing a piece on encroachment near the Gomti when her encrypted ProtonMail pinged. The subject line read simply: “1994. Truth rots slowly.” Attached…

  • Crime - English

    Mirror of Shadow

    July 22, 2025 - By 

    Sujan Ganguly 1 The rain had just begun to tap lightly against the wrought-iron balconies of Ballygunge’s aging colonial mansions when Ayesha Dutta was last seen. It was a quiet Wednesday afternoon in late July, and the streets of the upscale South Kolkata neighborhood glistened with monsoon stillness. Ayesha, seventeen and self-possessed beyond her years, had told her mother she was going to visit a friend to discuss a school literary project. Instead, she walked into the ivy-covered gates of Ananda Apartments — a five-story heritage building, once home to freedom fighters and now to retired bureaucrats, eccentric artists, and…

  • English - Suspense

    The Whispering Walls of Park Street

    July 12, 2025 - By 

    Arpita Roy Chapter 1:  Shreya Sengupta had always been a woman in motion, but now, after years of relentless hustle in Mumbai, she sought peace. The city had been exciting, demanding, and exhausting all at once, but the weight of it had worn her down. So, when the opportunity to move back to Kolkata presented itself, she seized it without a second thought. Her roots, her family, and the quieter rhythms of her childhood beckoned. She’d missed the sounds of the Howrah Bridge, the scent of street food wafting through narrow lanes, and the rhythm of the monsoon rains. Kolkata,…

  • English - Young Adult

    The Monsoon Letterbox

    July 4, 2025 - By 

    Aarohi Jadhav Chapter 1: Rain, Reluctance, and Rust The bus ride to Dapoli was as grey and endless as the monsoon clouds that followed it. Vanya Kale sat hunched beside the window, her earbuds silent, the phone in her lap long out of charge. Her mother’s hurried goodbye still echoed in her ears — “It’s just for a month, sweetheart. He’s your grandfather, not a ghost.” But to Vanya, it was all the same. Her grandfather, Arvind Kale, a once-famous Marathi poet, now lived alone in a crumbling house overlooking the sea, speaking to no one and surrounded by furniture…

  • English - Horror - Suspense

    The Red Saree

    July 3, 2025 - By 

    Niyati Sharma Chapter 1: The rain was relentless as the ferry docked at Mandwa jetty. Ishita Karve stepped onto the slick platform, her umbrella barely holding against the salty wind. Beside her, Aaditya Deshmukh stood with quiet pride, his suitcase in one hand and a folded umbrella in the other. The car that awaited them—a vintage black Ambassador driven by an old man with sun-wrinkled skin and sharp eyes—was to take them to their new home: Villa Rosa, the Deshmukh ancestral property gifted to them as a wedding present. Ishita had only seen photos of it—a white Portuguese-style house with…

  • English - Suspense

    The Return to Dhanakpur

    July 2, 2025 - By 

    Arvind Ray Chapter 1: The Hit-and-Run Vikram Jadhav had never imagined his life would change because of a late-night accident, especially not in Mumbai, where chaos reigned at every corner. It was around midnight when he was returning from a meeting with investors. The street was dimly lit, with rainwater shimmering in the orange glow of the street lamps. The city was unusually quiet for a Friday night. Vikram’s car rolled smoothly over the wet asphalt as he thought about the potential success of his tech startup, when suddenly, a blur of motion caught his eye. He slammed on the…

  • English - Young Adult

    The Sky Beneath Jaisalmer

    June 24, 2025 - By 

    Sreeparna Bajpai Chapter One: The Desert Exile Inaaya Khan squinted through the dusty window of the jeep as the golden sprawl of Jaisalmer crept into view. It looked less like a city and more like a mirage—a honeycomb of sandstone rising from the endless dunes, its turrets and balconies blurred by waves of heat dancing above the ground. The driver, a leathery old man with a marigold behind his ear, had barely spoken since they left the railway station, except to complain about the temperature and how the summer came early this year. Inaaya didn’t mind the silence. She leaned…