Aru Shah and the End of Time

Aru Shah and the End of Time is the first book of Pandava Quartet by Roshani Chokshi. It was released on March 27, 2018.

Unleashing the Sleeper
Aru Shah is a twelve-year-old girl who lives with her mother Dr. K. P. Shah at the Museum of Ancient Indian Art and Culture, with no whereabouts of her father. She is imaginative and has a habit of twisting the truth, a trait developed to cope with her mother's distant attitude and to fit in with others at Augustus Day School, an elite school she attended. Her rich classmates—Poppy Lopez, Burton Prater and Arielle Reddy–arrive at the Museum and discover that she was lying about going to France with her mother during break, recording her to expose her lies. Aru had once told them truthfully about a cursed lamp–the Diya of Bharata–in the Museum, which, according to a Hindu legend, if lit, would awaken the Sleeper, a demon who will summon Shiva, the god of destruction who will perform a cosmic dance to bring the world to destruction. To avoid the shame, Aru lights a cursed lamp to prove it was cursed and that she is not a liar, which begins to awaken the Sleeper, whose duty is to awaken Shiva,

A pigeon, who calls itself Subala, but Aru calls him Boo, steps out of an elephant statue's mouth and calls Aru one of the reincarnations of the Pandavas as only a Pandava can light the diya. She goes to the Door of Many to summons her awakened sibling. As a reincarnation of a Pandava,  she is a child of a God and hence a demigod. Time is frozen, while Aru has to find the reincarnations of the Pandava brothers while journeying through Naraka. She meets Mini, daughter of Dharma Raja, the first germaphobe demigod in the worlds, and finds out she is the child of Indra and reincarnation of Arjuna.

Adventure begins
She goes to the otherworld, where there are moths who form the shape of a crocodile, Makara. He confirms they are humans and opens the gate to the Court of the Sky. Mini has acrophobia. “The sprig of youth". “The bite of adulthood.” “The sip of old age.” are needed to go the Netherworld. They get the first key from Brahmasura. Then they meet Valmiki for assistance, who gives them the mantra “Don’t look, don’t see, there’s no such thing as me." His Ants give him what appears to be the first draft:

IT WAS A DARK AND STORMY NIGHT WHEN GIRLS WITH PIGEON DID TAKE FLIGHT TO STOP THE SLEEPER IN HIS QUEST TO WAKE LORD SHIVA FROM HIS REST.

They realize Boo is Shakhuni in the library and Sleeper takes him with him. The magic headband from Ritus makes Sleeper forget about the vahanas. Uchchaihshravas takes her to a tunnel house. She meets Mini. They hit the fire and poison with stones and manage to get the third key. They journey to Naraka, where the meet Ek and Do (1 and 2) tand Chitrigupta who gives them good karma and soma and a pen. They go to the Palace of Illusions which gives them tests. They meet Shukla,  Guardian of the Bridge of Forgetting and gets Aru cursed. They look for celestial weapons which seem to be rotten. They rely on knowledge from finding Nemo to get out of a water monster. Their antics reveal the true gifts as Indra's Vajra and  Dharma Raja's danda. Aru realizes her mother loved Sleeper and that she was his son. The share good karma with Past Time and Wish, who let's them go. Meanwhile, general public mistake the supernatural happenings to be a disease called Frozen Syndrome.

Back to Museum
Aru then has a fight with her father in the museum. She is about to kill him, but hesitates and he escapes. She thinks it is the curse of Shukla. Aru's mother and friends are freed, mother first. She blackmails her friends with their secrets and they leave her alone.

The End
Then the story opens at the end of winter break. Aru is invited by Arielle, but she rejects it. Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, for three hours, Aru and Mini learned war strategy from Hanuman, dancing and etiquette from Urvashi, and folklore from Boo. On Fridays, their first class was traditional dance (specifically, bharatnatyam) and etiquette with Urvashi. Hanuman’s lessons were a lot more rugged. While learning from Hanuman, an alarm sounds, and he tells them that something important has been stolen, something even the gods fear. On a Saturday, Mini is at Aru's house and Boo is telling them to practice. A wolf holding a golden bow steps out and transforms into a girl and dissappears. Boo tells them she is the next Pandava, leaving them horrified.

Chapter list

 * 1) In Which Aru Regrets Opening The Door
 * 2) Oops
 * 3) Wake Up
 * 4) In-ep-tee-tood
 * 5) The Other Sister
 * 6) Look, but Not Really
 * 7) The Council or Guardians
 * 8) Who's Your Daddy?
 * 9) The Three Keys
 * 10) A Trip to the Beauty Salon
 * 11) Ashes, Ashes, We All Fall Down
 * 12) Bring On the Next Demon! Wait, Maybe Not...
 * 13) The Hipster in the Anthill
 * 14) A Trip to the Grocery Store
 * 15) Why Are All Enchanted Things So Rude?
 * 16) That Was So Last Season
 * 17) The Library of A-Z
 * 18) A Strange Case
 * 19) I Really... REALLY... Wouldn't Do That
 * 20) Welp, She Did It
 * 21) The Door and the Dogs
 * 22) Who's a Good Boy?
 * 23) Soul Index
 * 24) Dare, Disturb, Deign
 * 25) What Meets the Eye (and What Doesn't)
 * 26) My Home, Not Yours! No Touchie!
 * 27) ...And Then Came the Horde of Godzilla-Size Fireflies
 * 28) The Palace's Story
 * 29) The Bridge of Forgetting
 * 30) The Tale of Shukra
 * 31) This Place Smells Funky
 * 32) 1 on Mini's Top Ten Ways I Don't Want to Die List: Death by Halitosis
 * 33) I'll Be a Cow in My Next Life
 * 34) The Pool of the Past
 * 35) Can You Give Me Better Hair on the Way Out?
 * 36) The TV Started It
 * 37) Attack!
 * 38) Aru Shah Is a Liar
 * 39) Who's the Liar Now?
 * 40) Failure
 * 41) Got All That?
 * 42) Word Vomit
 * 43) Why, Why, Why? Stupid Words
 * 44) Woof

Trivia

 * Aru Shah and the End of Time will be the first book released by Rick Riordan Presents.
 * Aru saw a vision that her sisters would turn on her and attempt to kill her.