Anant ‘f***ing’ Reddy is dead. A simple suicide is ruled by a murder when the coroner finds something sharp embedded in his eye. His business tycoon father wants answers, so Inspector Meenakshi Rao has been ordered not to sleep, eat or drink till she finds the killer.
Her suspects – 3 women who live in the complex where his mangled body was found. A desperate mother turned dominatrix. A woman with baby fever whose husband can’t get a rise without masturbating. A devout Christian and closeted lesbian with a voyeur fetish.
With her own marriage in shambles, all that Meenakshi wants is to get stoned so that she can communicate with her dead son. Can she find the killer?
‘Shameless in Stilettos’ by an award-winning author Ell P (Lakshmi Priya) is a gripping crime novel that weaves together suspense, intricate characters, and emotional depth. Readers who enjoy Big Little Lies and Fifty Shades of Grey will be captivated by its unexpected twists, intense tension, and daring erotic elements.
Set in an Indian middle-class neighbourhood, the story follows the investigation of a brutal murder, filled with unexpected turns. The book explores themes of grief, trauma, and self-discovery while addressing taboo topics like BDSM, voyeurism, and unconventional desires, challenging societal norms.
With fast-paced writing and compelling characters, Shameless in Stilettos is an addictive read for fans of dark crime fiction and emotional, thought-provoking stories.
Ell P (Lakshmi Priya) is an award-winning writer, artist, professional, and an occasional animal rescuer. Born and raised across India (thanks to her father’s ever-moving job), she attended 13 different schools and colleges; not because she failed, but because life refused to sit still. With close to two decades in the corporate world, she now leads global learning programs at a multinational. Why not work as a full-time writer, you ask? Because a girl’s got to eat!
Her true passion however, is spinning a damn good yarn. Writing has been her constant companion since childhood, but things got serious in August 2014 when she joined Write Club Bangalore, a breeding ground for literary talent. From there, she co-founded LitLatte, a publishing platform that produced two anthologies, and later ‘The Hive’, an indie publishing collective that has launched five anthologies (four featuring her work).
She also would write for Women’s Web, lending her voice to powerful narratives about women’s experiences. Her work has appeared in their anthologies When Women Speak Up and No Apologies. In total, she has 20 books to her name—18 anthologies, a horror novella and her debut novel, Shameless in Stilettos released in November, 2024, published by Tara Press.
Ell P has been featured as the author of the month for Women’s Web multiple times. She has also been featured in Deccan Herald along with the co-founders of Litlatte. She has also been awarded the Orange Flower award as the winner in the short fiction category in the Orange Flower Festival 2021.
She lives in The Netherlands with her teenage son and two little senior pugs, Puffball and Walnut. She co-parents the human and fur babies, and supports her retired parents, who remain politely unimpressed by her literary accomplishments.
In order to delve deeper into how ‘Shameless in Stilettos’ took shape, Sonakshi Datta of GoaChronicle asked Ell P a few questions.
‘Shameless in Stilettos’ Author Ell P
What made you weave a whodunnit set in an Indian background, as even though always intriguing, this genre still needs a lot of recognition in the Indian context?
Why should London, Paris, LA and New York have all the murder and mayhem? India is steeped in layers of rich history, stratified social dynamics, and deep, dark secrets. It is a playground for crime fiction. Like most readers, I grew up reading Agatha Christie, James Hadley Chase, Jeffrey Archer, and by the time I reached my twenties I was tired of reading whodunnits set in foggy European alleys when I knew that our quiet bungalows, upscale clubs, and back alleys tell stories just as compelling.
In the last decade, you see more and more Indian authors penning thrillers set in places like Delhi, Kanpur etc. Damyanti Biswas’ ‘You Beneath Your Skin’ and Richa S. Mukherjee’s ‘Kanpur Khoofiya Pvt Ltd’ series, to name a couple.
Crime fiction in India is gaining a steady rise with an unapologetic voice, and Shameless in Stilettos is just a part of that movement.
Now for the setting of Shameless in Stilettos, I chose Bangalore, because if there is one city that knows how to keep secrets, serve scandal with a side of filter coffee, and wrap it all up in traffic so thick you could hide a crime scene in it; it is this one.
Bangalore is home, so I know its polished exteriors and its shadowy corners. Bangalore has this effortless duality; tradition meets rebellion, sophistication meets scandal, silk sarees meet stilettos. And what’s a murder mystery without a city that thrives on contradictions?
What important themes revolve around the main storyline in your book?
At its core, ‘Shameless in Stilettos’ is a murder mystery wrapped in power play, dark desires, and society’s obsession with controlling women.
The book fearlessly dives into themes of exploring female sexuality, gender roles, and the facades people maintain to survive. Motherhood is put under a magnifying glass; what it means to have it, what it demands, and what it means to lose it. Control is another major theme; who has it, who pretends they do, and who is willing to kill to keep it. And then, of course, there is Inspector Meenakshi Rao; grieving, reckless, furious, absolutely not your typical, noble detective.
A lot of crime fiction keeps things neat; murder happens, a detective solves it, order is restored. But in real life things are way more complicated. And I wanted this book to be just that; bold, messy, and unapologetically real.
As a lot of themes in your novel challenge pre-existing societal norms, what do you think is the strongest message/lesson imparted by your book?
If Shameless in Stilettos has one loud, unapologetic message, it is this, “No one is just one thing”. We are all contradictions; mothers with dark desires, wives with hidden regrets, powerful women battling insecurities, and detectives who do not always play by the rules. Society loves to put people into neat little boxes, but this book rips those boxes apart and walks away in killer heels.
Through its tangled web of crime, power, and pleasure, the book asks, what if the things we judge in others are the very things we hide in ourselves? We love to pretend certain topics like sexuality, unconventional relationships, female ambition etc, do not exist, especially in “respectable” spaces. But they do. And the more we try to suppress them, the more they thrive in the shadows.
So, if there is a lesson here, it is to embrace the parts of yourself that do not fit the mould. Be honest about desire, ambition, and the things that make you feel alive. And most importantly, never underestimate a woman in stilettos.
How difficult or easy do you reckon writing a murder mystery is, because there could only be creativity and inspirations, rather than experience, for coming up with a nail-biting story for such a genre?
Oh, writing a murder mystery is like setting up the perfect crime; only instead of running from the cops, you are dodging plot holes and outsmarting your own readers. It is a game of misdirection.
With Shameless in Stilettos, I made things even more fun (read: complicated) by writing it in two timelines. One set after the murder, following the investigation, and the other leading up to the crime, showing all the dark secrets that brought my characters to the edge. It is like a slow-burn disaster, you already know someone is dead, but the real question is, how did it get this bad?
The challenge is not just who did it, it is why should the reader care. The best crime stories are not just about the murder; they are about the tangled mess of human emotions, betrayals, and bad decisions that led to it. And I employed the dual timeline structure to make that unravelling even more suspenseful, letting readers play detective in both the past and the present.
As for inspiration for crime fiction; isn’t it everywhere? The news, hushed conversations in cafés, true crime documentaries, real life is full of plot twists if you know where to look.
So, is writing a murder mystery easy? Absolutely not. But is it dangerously addictive? Oh, 100 percent. And once you start plotting fictional crimes, you will never look at the world the same way again.
What makes ‘Shameless in Stilettos’ a must-read for all, especially for crime-thriller enthusiasts?
Because Shameless in Stilettos isn’t just a whodunnit; it is a ‘why the hell did they do it?’ wrapped in scandal, alternative sexual preferences, non-traditional dynamics and power play with a whole lot of secrets. It is for crime-thriller lovers who crave a mystery that is not just about catching a killer, but about peeling back the layers of power, obsession, and desire.
Also read it for its women; from Mia, the mother who would go to extremes to give her child a good life, to Rachel, our resident good girl gone bad. From Nisha, the doctor with a baby fever, to Sheeba, the small-time model who married into money, and can be easily mistaken for a gold digger.
But the real thrill is Inspector Meenakshi Rao who breaks the carefully crafted mould of a traditional detective. Meenakshi is raw, real, and definitely not here to make friends. She has got grief the size of a crater, a blurry moral compass, and a substance problem. She is not here to follow society’s rules; she is here to dig up the truth, even if it destroys her in the process.
‘Shameless in Stilettos’ is a sharp, unfiltered look at gender, sexuality, and the impossible standards society forces on women. It is dark, it is provocative, and it refuses to whisper when it can roar.
