Bharti Kirchner Books In Order

Publication Order of Maya Mallick Mystery Books

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Non-Fiction Books

Publication Order of Anthologies

Bharti Kirchner
Before becoming a writer, author Bharti Kirchner worked as a systems engineer for IBM and as a systems manager for Bank of America, San Francisco. Bharti’s also worked in Europe as well as other continents as a computer systems consultant.

Bharti has won a City Artist’s Project Grant, a SALA Award, two 4-Culture literature awards, two Artist Trust GAP grants, and two Seattle Arts Commission literature grants. “Goddess of Fire” was shortlisted for the Nancy Pearl Award.

She is also an award winning cook, with her second cookbook, called “Indian Inspired”, being selected in 1993 as one of the top ten cookbooks by USA Today and the Chicago Tribune.

She has written many essays and articles about travel, fitness, food, and lifestyle in magazines which include Eating Well, Food & Wine, Vegetarian Times, Writer’s Digest, Northwest Travel, The Writer, and Fitness Plus. She has profiled celebrities for the International Examiner and is a freelance book reviewer for the Seattle Times.

Bharti’s debut novel, called “Shiva Dancing”, was released in the year 1998. Her work is from the mystery and historical fiction genres. She’s also written some cookbooks.

“Pastries” is a stand alone novel and was released in the year 2003. Sunya Malhotra, a young woman whose parents migrated from India, works as the owner and head baker of Pastries, which is a cozy and warm bakery located in Seattle. Sunya loves to bake and has turned her wonderful tarts and cakes into delicious works of art. The success of her much loved baker gets put in jeopardy, though, when a chain bakery threatens to open up just down the road from her.

To add to her current misery, Roger (her Japanese boyfriend) left her for a “perfect” Japanese girlfriend and her mom has just got engaged to a guy that Sunya detests. She also has not yet reconciled to the mystery of a dad missing since she was born. Even starting a new relationship with a young, hot film director that is in town to cover the 1999 World Trade Conference, cannot help Sunya with her largest worry, she has lost her touch to bake.

Overwhelmed with everything, she is surprised to find herself listening when her new Japanese baker offers up a solution to all her problems. Enroll in a baking school in Japan. Of course, this ain’t just any baking school. It’s run by Mori Matsumoto, a famous Japanese baker, and it is based on the principle of mindfulness. Quickly, she finds herself learning all the basics of baking once again. Is this what she truly needs to find herself again? Is she going to recapture her zest for life and work?

“Tulip Season” is the first novel in the “Mitra Basu Mystery” series and was released in the year 2012. A callous and wealthy husband. One missing domestic-violence counselor. A dangerous romance.

Kareena Sinha, an Indian-American who works as a domestic-violence counselor, vanishes from her Seattle home. When the cops dismiss suspicions that she was a victim of spousal abuse, Mitra Basu, her best friend and a young landscape designer, decides to find her.

Mitra’s investigation reveals glimpses about a secret life that involves her friend and a Bollywood actor with a bad reputation. Mitra follows the trail and gets lured back to India where she finds out about the actor’s connections to the Mumbai underworld and his financial problems. It lands her in a tangled web of life-threatening intrigue, and Mitra cannot be sure of Kareena’s safety. Or even her own.

“Goddess of Fire” is a stand alone novel and was released in the year 2015. One young widow becomes one of the most powerful women in all of India.

India in 1684. Moorti, who was widowed at the age of seventeen and is going to burned on her husband’s funeral pyre, gets saved from the fire by one mysterious Englishman. Taken to safety and given employment by Job Charnock, her savior, and is renamed Maria and has to embrace her brand new life among the English traders.

Even though she is grateful to still be alive, the talented and brilliant Maria is not content to just be a kitchen servant for the rest of her life. Seizing the chance to learn English, she hopes that this is going to bring her much closer to the gentle and kind Job. However, with so many obstacles in her way, is she going to be able to overcome adversity in her pursuit of a life that is better?

“Season of Sacrifice” is the first novel in the “Maya Mallick Mystery” series and was released in the year 2017. Maya Mallick is taking a morning stroll in Seattle’s Green Lake district and is horrified to see to young ladies, both shrouded in white, set themselves on fire in front of the temporary residence of the visiting Chinese minister. She is even stunned to recognize one of them: Sylvie Burton, an intelligent Tibetan-American biomedical student, and is the adopted sister of Maya’s best friend.

One onlooker informs her that these two women are martyrs, protesting the Chinese occupation of Tibet. Maya has a nagging suspicion that all isn’t like it appears. With so much to live for, why would Sylvie want to end her life in such a horrific way like this? While Maya gets ever closer to the shocking truth, the more she finds her life being put on the line as well.

“Murder at Andaman” is the second novel in the “Maya Mallick Mystery” series and was released in the year 2020. Maya Mallick’s best friend’s husband, who is a popular book publisher, gets murdered on the Andaman Islands. And Maya, a Seattle-based private detective, is called on to solve this case.

It is very painful for her to dig into his secret life and recognize that she has been fooled by this man. Would she ever be able to forgive him? On top of this, she suspects that her friend is guilty of some wrongdoing. Could their cherished friendship survive under these kinds of circumstances? What are the true limits of friendship?