Varun Mannava was born in Visakhapatnam and raised in Chennai. At the age of eighteen, he delivered newspapers and magazines for a living. This was just a passing phase. After completing his twelfth grade, he could not join any college for two years. His family was struggling financially. He used to always imagine that he was born for greater things. He got through Madras Christian College in 2003 but still had to work to get his family going. So, he joined Sathyam Cinemas as a customer relations associate. Every day he used to attend college between 8:00 in the morning and 1:00 in the afternoon. By 3:00 in the afternoon, he would reach Sathyam Cinemas and work there till 11:00 in the evening. This went on for three years. By 2006, one fine day, New York’s largest stand-alone hedge fund D. E. Shaw & Co., picked him for its Indian operations at Hyderabad through campus interview. Varun owes his life to his college, the three years in Sathyam Cinemas and the seven years in D. E. Shaw India. In 2013, he moved to Gurgaon from Hyderabad to work for a Wall Street bank. He was awestruck by the lifestyle this city had to offer. The day he walked into Striker, Gurgaon (a popular pub) in 2013, he knew it was going to change his life forever! Today, the hunch has come true. He has written his first book.