Deepti Kapoor's new thriller was a favorite among Tertulia's staff picks for January new releases.

The book was just reviewed by Ron Charles in the The Washington Post and this is what he said: "Swinging from the hovels to the palaces of contemporary India, this hypnotic story poses a horrible dilemma: For days, I was torn between gorging on Age of Vice or rationing out the chapters to make them last. Finally free from the book's grip now all I want to do is get others hooked... This is a rare case of a book bounding as high as its hype."

Preorder Age of Vice (Ships January 2)

Read an excerpt of the book below.

A police van with four cops inside arrives at the crash site. They climb out and see the dead bodies, and the wailing, angry crowd that now surrounds the car. There’s someone still inside! A young man, sitting bolt upright, arms braced  at the wheel, eyes shut tightly. Is he dead? Did he die like that? The cops push  the rabble aside and peer in. “Is he sleeping?” one cop says to his colleagues. These words cause the driver to turn his head and, like some monster, open  his eyes. The cop looks back and almost jumps in fright. There’s something  grotesque about the driver’s smooth, handsome face. His eyes are leering and  wild, but other than that, there’s not a hair out of place. The cops pull open  the door, wave their lathis thunderously, order him out. There’s an empty  bottle of Black Label at his feet. He’s a lean man, gym honed, wearing a gray  gabardine safari suit, hair parted millimeter fine, impeccably oiled. Beneath the reek of whisky there’s another scent: Davidoff Cool Water, not that these cops know.

What they know is this: he’s not a rich man, not a rich man at all, rather a  facsimile, a man dressed in the imitation of wealth: in its service. The clothes,  the well-groomed features, the car, they cannot hide the essential poverty of his  birth; its smell is stronger than any liquor or cologne. 

Yes, he’s a servant, a chauffeur, a driver, a “ boy.” 

A well-fed and housebroken version of what lies dead on the road. And this is not his Mercedes. 

Which means he can be hurt.

He sobs in oblivion as the cops drag him out. Bent double, he vomits on his own  loafers. One cop hits him with his lathi, hauls him up. Another searches his  body, finds his wallet, finds an empty shoulder holster, finds a matchbook from  a hotel called the Palace Grande, finds a money clip holding twenty thousand rupees. 

Whose car is this? 

Where did the money come from? 

Who did you steal it from? 

Thought you’ d go for a joyride? 

Whose liquor is it? 

Chutiya, where’s the gun? 

Fucker, who do you work for? 

In his wallet there’s an election card, a driver’s license, three hundred rupees. His cards say he is Ajay. His father’s name is Hari. He was born January 1,  1982. 

And the Mercedes? It is registered to one Gautam Rathore. 

The cops confer: the name sounds familiar. And the address—Aurangzeb  Road—speaks for itself. Only the rich and the powerful live there. “Chutiya,” an officer barks, holding up the car’s papers. “Is this your boss?” But this young man called Ajay is too drunk to speak. 

“Asshole, did you take his car?” 

One of the cops walks to the side and looks down at the dead. The girl’s eyes  are open, skin already blue in the cold. She is bleeding from the space between  her legs, where life has been. 

In the station Ajay is stripped and left naked in a cold and windowless room.  He’s so drunk he passes out. The constables return to throw icy water over him  and he wakes with a scream. He is seated, and they press his shoulders against the wall, pull his legs apart. A female constable stands on his thighs until his  circulation goes and he roars in pain and passes out once more.

By the next day the case has gained traction. The media is appalled. At first it’s  about the pregnant girl. News channels mourn her. But she was neither photogenic nor full of promise. So the focus shifts to the killer. A source confirms the  car is a Mercedes registered to Gautam Rathore, and this is news—he’s a fixture of the Delhi social scene, a polo player, a raconteur, and a prince, genuine  royalty, the first and only son of a member of Parliament, Maharaja Prasad  Singh Rathore. Was Gautam Rathore driving? That’s the question on every one’s lips. But no, no, his alibi is watertight. He was holidaying away from  Delhi last night. He was at a fort palace hotel near Jaipur. His current location  is unknown. But he has released a statement expressing his horror, sending his  condolences to the deceased and their kin. The driver, his statement reveals,  only recently began working for him. He seems to have taken the Mercedes  without Gautam’s knowledge. Taken whisky and the Mercedes and gone for an  illicit spin. 

A statement from the police confirms as much: Ajay, employee of Gautam  Rathore, stole a bottle of whisky from Rathore’s home while his employer was  away, took the Mercedes for a joyride, lost control. 

This story becomes fact. 

It settles in the papers. 

And the FIR is registered. 

Ajay, son of Hari, is booked under Section 304A of the Indian Penal Code.  Death due to negligence. Maximum sentence: two years. 

He is sent to the crowded courthouse and presented to the district magistrate,  the magistrate takes two minutes to send him to judicial custody with no con sideration of bail. He is driven with the other prisoners on a bus to Tihar Jail.  They are lined up for processing; they sit in sullen rows on wooden benches in  the reception hall, surrounded by placards with rules hammered into the  damp, pockmarked plaster of the walls. When his turn arrives, he’s taken into  a cramped office where a clerk and a prison doctor with their typewriter and stethoscope await. His possessions are laid out once more: wallet, money clip  containing twenty thousand rupees, the book of matches bearing the name  Palace Grande, the empty shoulder holster. The money is counted. The clerk takes his pencil and begins to fill out the form. 

“Name?” 

The prisoner stares at them. 

“Name?” 

“Ajay,” he says, barely audible. 

“Father’s name?” 

“Hari.” 

“Age?” 

“Twenty-two.” 

“Occupation?” 

“Driver.” 

“Speak up.” 

“Driver.” 

“Who is your employer?” 

The clerk looks over his glasses. 

“What is the name of your employer?” 

“Gautam Rathore.” 

Ten thousand rupees are taken from his money, the rest is handed back  to him. 

“Put it in your sock,” the clerk says. 

He is processed and sent to Jail No. 1, led through the courtyard to the barracks,  taken along the dank corridor to a wide cell where nine other inmates live, crowded and packed. Clothes hang from the cell bars like in a market stall, and  the floor inside is covered with tattered mattresses, blankets, buckets, bundles,  sacks. A small squatting latrine in the corner. Though there’s no room left, the  warden orders a small space to be cleared out for him on the cold floor next to  the latrine. But no mattress can be spared. Ajay lays the blanket he’s been given  on the stone floor. He sits with his back to the wall, staring vacantly ahead. A few of his cellmates come and tell him their names, but he says nothing, acknowledges nothing. He curls into a ball and sleeps. 

When he comes to, he sees a man standing over him. Old and missing teeth,  with frantic eyes. More than sixty years on earth, he is saying. More than sixty  years. He’s an autorickshaw driver from Bihar, or at least he was on the outside. He’s been here awaiting trial for six years. He’s innocent. It’s one of the  first things he says. “I’m innocent. I’m supposed to be a drug peddler. But I’m  innocent. I was caught in the wrong place. A peddler was in my rickshaw, but  he ran and the cops took me.” He goes on to ask what Ajay is charged with, how  much money he has hidden away with him. Ajay ignores him, turns in the op posite direction. “Suit yourself,” the old man cheerfully says, “ but you should  know, I can get things done around here. For one hundred rupees I can get you  another blanket, for one hundred rupees I can get you a better meal.” “Let him  be,” hollers another cellmate, a plump, dark boy from Aligarh, who is picking  his teeth with a piece of neem. “Don’t you know who he is, he’s the Mercedes  Killer.” The old man shuffles off. “I’m Arvind,” the fat boy says. “They say I  killed my wife, but I’m innocent.” 

This excerpt has been reprinted with permission from the publisher, Riverhead Books.