And so we get engrossed in the story of Ms Sapna Sinha in something like seven distinct short stories linked with a testing experience, and then find that this book (which seems carefully crafted to make another Bollywood-style film) diverting into a weird whodunnit story. Eventually she passes the first six tests in style.
Everything slowly seems to be falling into place for her to win an ultra-successful career - but there comes a twist at the end. ''In life you never get what you deserve, you get what you negotiate'' is the opening line of the novel, and it closes with: ''Life does not always gives us what we desire, but it eventually does give us what we deserve.''
Swarup obviously uses the tale of a young woman's moral fortitude to take up many issues of corruption in modern India - such as child labour, forced marriage, acid attacks, sexual assault and gang rape, selling kidneys for illegal organ transplants and murder.
Sapna, the heroine, who was an ordinary sales assistant in an electronics store in Delhi, is a determined underdog who faces up to amazing odds in her adventures, the worst of them appearing to be the corruption of officials who should help, but she seems to emerge suitably undaunted and even buys a book to study about the world of a CEO in big business. The other characters are much more sketchily drawn - which should help in casting a film but is not so interesting for a reader.
The fast pace of this story probably overcomes the abundance of coincidences and stretching of credibility. I found it entertaining to read, although tended to lose track of some identities at times because of the foreign ring to their Indian names.
- Geoff Adams is a former ODT editor.
