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The Accidental Apprentice
Author: Vikas Swarup

Publisher: Simon & Schuster
ISBN: 9781471128240
Pages: 448
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In The Accidental Apprentice, Sapna Sinha is a girl whose family depends on her earnings to survive. Sapna is from a middle class family. After her father’s death, she had to take over the responsibility of her family. She has a mother and a younger sister with big dreams to take care of. Sapna is determined to do something meaningful with her life.

She works in an electronics shop as a salesperson. She does not like the job much, but she has little choice left, or so she thinks. She soon gets a choice that she could not have thought of in her wildest dreams. One day, when Sapna is on her way back home from her job, she is approached by Vinay Mohan Acharya, one of the biggest business tycoons in the country. He is about to make an offer that will change her life.

Acharya offers her the chance to be the CEO of his company, provided she passes seven tests he is about to set her. Sapna is skeptical at first, but later decides to accept Acharya’s offer. From that moment on, her life changes. As she goes through the various ordeals of her tests, The Accidental Apprentice also offers a glimpse of the many social and political problems plaguing the country.

The challenges set by Acharya test her courage, resourcefulness, strength of character, her ability to think quickly and act on her decisions. Her challenges force her to face the many faces of evil in society. She has to deal with situations involving corruption, forced marriage, illegal trafficking of human organs, child labor, and sexual assault. She overcomes each challenge, proving that Acharya has chosen well, but there is still the last challenge to be faced.

The final challenge proves to be a personal ordeal of huge proportions and it completely changes her life. The Accidental Apprentice details how Sapna deals with all these challenges and how this changes her life.