The Raj Quartet, Volume 2: The Day of the Scorpion

The powerful, moving second volume of Paul Scott's classic account of the last days of British rule in India

In The Day of the Scorpion, Scott draws us deeper in to his epic of India at the close of World War II. With force and subtlety, he recreates both private ambition and perversity, and the politics of an entire subcontinent at a turning point in history.

As the scorpion, encircled by a ring of fire, will sting itself to death, so does the British raj hasten its own destruction when th...