Upadhyay is not for all tastes, a modern writer of literary fiction working to reconcile a Nepali present with its haunted past. Set in the waning days of monarchy in the shadow of the internal massacre of the royal family, the country is stalked by various political factions like the Young Maoists, meets challenges to familial traditions, struggles with employment and security of home, and does not yet see a way to domestic, political, or even personal stability. 

His characters, then, exist in these spaces, making what we might see as ordinary choices in love and schooling, neighborliness and manners, all while navigating these uncertainties. They may wish to stay aloof from politics, liaison across caste lines, or simple choose charitable acts; but none can remain isolated or untouched by the "royal ghosts" of the title story. 

It is a vivid and real snapshot of a fragile moment in Nepali history, captured and rendered by a storyteller adept and subtle. The disturbing and violent opening story, "A Refugee," sets this pattern up fairly clearly. And for the remaining nine stories, Upadhyay drops us into scenes, in medias res, to watch characters innocent or shamed struggle through. He leaves us in uncertainties and misfortunes often enough: what is domestic is political; what is romantic is impoverished. 

We take them as they are, these moments and miscues, failures and resignations, as the best we can muster as ground and air shift, as we wonder at a past too mortal.