Shiva Naipaul's premature death in 1985 at the age of forty from a heart attack was a tragic loss for West Indian and contemporary letters. The vocation of writing set him on the road to independence from his famous brother V. S. Naipaul (1932- ), whom he regarded as his exemplar. While it can be argued that some of his work is derivative, his three novels, his three controversial but altogether fascinating travel books, his excellent short stories, and his numerous newspaper and magazine articles bear his own pungent signature and are persuasive evidence that he succeeded for the most part in establishing a separate and distinctive voice. Although his travel books and journalism are sometimes too caustic and candid for some commentators, his best work, such as Black and White (1980), a comprehensive and superb analysis of the 1978 Jonestown disaster in Guyana, is a model of evocative and lucid writing...