In fact, amid the release of Happy New Year in 2014, Shah had been feverishly penning a collection of horror short stories, which didn't find any significant takers. The failure led him to look at his own writing more critically, eventually making way for his new novel.

Living Hell is a noir murder mystery, which tells the story of Nadeem Sayed Khatib aka Nadeem Chipkali, a police informant with a criminal past, who gets embroiled in the murder conspiracy of his neighbour Makhija. With all fingers pointed at him, Nadeem is forced to play detective, relying on his wits and an unexpected motley crew of people from the underworld to trace the perpetrator.

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A huge fan of the classical 19th-century British sleuth fiction, as well as the hard-boiled American pulp and private-eye thrillers that emerged in the post-world war era, Shah says his book is a homage to both these genres. "I'd like to see my work as a post-modern spin to this kind of genre fiction." The milieu for his novel was inspired by Bandra - the area where he grew up. "While Bandra now enjoys a reputation of being a posh suburb, in the '90s, it was infamous for a lot of street-corner hoodlums. There were several gangs in the area, and some of those goons were also marginal figures in the underworld. From an anthropological point of view, I was quite fascinated by these gangsters. Bhaigiri had almost become a sub-culture."

While writing the book took Shah about six months, he spent a couple of years just "refining and revising" the text. "I wrote nearly four drafts, before the editor found it good to go. We really wanted this book to stand out as a piece of genre fiction."

Here, he jokes about how he is likely to have put both his parents off from reading his book. "I have been writing obsessively for the last few years, and each time I wrote something new, I would rush to them and ask for their feedback. They have read some of my worst works and are very harsh critics. Now, when I give them something to read, they are like, 'Oh damn! Why do we have to read this again?' I think I will need to win their interest back and literally woo them into reading my new novel."

Having said that, Shah, whose debut thriller is undoubtedly fast-paced, is hoping to establish himself as a writer who is able to encapsulate the gritty side of his city. "Being a Mumbai writer is definitely the identity I want for myself. Of course, my first love is acting. But thanks to it, I got drawn into the world of books.

For an actor, I think it is important to have some grasp or interest in literature, because at the end of the day, we are communicating somebody else's vision on camera. The main appeal in literature for me is that it is an individualistic endeavour. Here, I am not wasting anyone's time or money to bring my own work into fruition. All I need is a pen and paper, and as an artiste, that is liberating."

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