How to Kidnap the Rich

'This is an absolute riot - part thriller, part satire of contemporary urban India' Mail on Sunday'If you're fat and Indian, you're rich; if you're fat and poor, you're lying. It's only the West where the rich are thin and vegan and moral...Ramesh Kumar grew up deprived and unloved, working on his father's tea stall in the Old City of Delhi. Now, brilliant but poor, he makes a lucrative living taking tests for the sons of India's elite. When one of his clients, the sweet but hapless eighteen-year-old Rudi Saxena, places first in the All Indias, the national university entrance exams, Ramesh sees an unmissable opportunity.Cashing in on Rudi's newfound celebrity, all goes well for both boys for a while. But Rudi's role on a game show leads to unexpected love, blackmail and, finally, a dangerous kidnapping.As Ramesh leads Rudi through a maze of crimes both large and small, their dizzying journey reveals an India in all its complexity, beauty, and squalor, moving from the bottom rungs to the circles inhabited by the ultra-rich and everywhere in between.Praise for How to Kidnap the Rich'A satire on modern India...this isn't a story about poverty, it's a story about wealth' Guardian'Conjures up a memorable world that is ghee-greased, polluted, mired in dust and corruption' Sunday Times'Like Mohsin Hamid's How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia, How to Kidnap the Rich purports to be a how-to manual but is in fact a rollicking urban adventure and a biting satire of inequality' Economist

A fun, fast-paced debut...HBO and the Oscar-nominated actor and producer Riz Ahmed have wisely already bought the screen rights to this Delhi-set, society-skewering debut caper...Raina, 28, was inspired to write How to Kidnap the Rich by the US "Varsity Blues" admissions scandal, but it is his depiction of bustling, hustling Delhi and its grafting populace that makes this tightly written, fast-paced, often sharply savage societal satire such a rollicking read. He conjures up a memorable world that is ghee-greased, polluted, mired in dust and corruption, but also thrusting...An impressively entertaining but also insightful debut, This is an absolute riot - part thriller, part satire of contemporary urban India...Ramesh is a wonderfully vivid character and this is an explosively funny, surprisingly moving debut, A joyous love/hate letter to contemporary Delhi . . . Genuine feeling flows beneath the potty-mouthed satire as it gradually spirals into farce. Rahul Raina suggests life may be "a relentless parade of fear", but it is far better to laugh than cry, India's politicians, endemic corruption, national obsession with the West and above all its super-rich come in for a bashing in How to Kidnap the Rich...what stands out in this book is its unapologetic depiction of a Delhi that's frankly a bit rubbish...But there's a fondness in this biting negativity, which convinces more than the graceful descriptive passages of other India-set novels. Chuck in twists and double-crossings, just the right amount of violence and a denouement in a besieged TV studio and you can't fail to be entertained, Like Mohsin Hamid's How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia, How to Kidnap the Rich purports to be a how-to manual but is in fact a rollicking urban adventure and a biting satire of inequality. Mr Raina adds a fast-paced crime caper and a stream of caustic humour.... a highly entertaining first novel from a writer to watch

Rahul Raina divides his time between Oxford and Delhi. He runs his own consultancy in England for part of the year, and works for charities for street children and teaches English in India in the down season.