Vaseem Khan is the author of two award-winning crime series set in India, the Baby Ganesh Agency series set in modern Mumbai, and the Malabar House historical crime novels set in 1950s Bombay. His first book, The Unexpected Inheritance of Inspector Chopra, was selected by the Sunday Times as one of the 40 best crime novels published 2015-2020, and is translated into 17 languages. The second in the series won the Shamus Award in the US. In 2018, he was awarded the Eastern Eye Arts, Culture and Theatre Award for Literature.  In 2021, Midnight at Malabar House won the Crime Writers Association Historical Dagger, the world’s premier award for historical crime fiction. When he isn’t writing, he works at the Department of Security and Crime Science at University College London. Vaseem was born in England, but spent a decade working in India. Vaseem also co-hosts the popular crime fiction podcast, The Red Hot Chilli Writers. In 2023, Vaseem was elected the first non-white Chair of the Crime Writers’ Association (the CWA), the oldest and largest association of crime writers in the UK.

A bit more about my job …  

Crime science is an approach to crime prevention, reduction and detection that attempts to use science from a range of disciplines – both engineering sciences and social sciences – to tackle crime. I consider myself lucky to be surrounded by brilliant colleagues all working on crime and security topics ranging from new forensic science techniques to developing the next generation of cyber-security measures. My role involves managing large-scale research projects. I spend a lot of time with academic colleagues and partners from the worlds of policing and security, as we seek to bring that research into the public domain.

And a little plug for my department …  

The UCL Department of Security and Crime Science is devoted specifically to reducing crime and other risks to personal and national security. It does this through teaching, research, public policy analysis and by the dissemination of evidence-based information on crime reduction and security enhancement. The department examines patterns in crime and security threats, and finds practical methods to disrupt these patterns.