I was really excited to read a book set in Edgware road, having lived there myself and being a middle eastern woman, I really appreciated the specificity and representation that the story provided. The writing is confident in a way that keeps you engaged and the plot itself is fine. I wouldn’t call it mind-blowingly good but you won’t be disappointed either, probably best described as being perfectly adequate.

*** I received an early complimentary copy of this book. The opinions expressed in this review are completely my own

This book is dual timeline, in one we follow the events that unfold as Alia waits at Edgware tube station for her father, Khalid, only he never shows and his body is later discovered by the police in what they describe to be an accidental drowning. In the other timeline we get to see Khalid as he falls in love and marries his wife, Suzie, and we meet little baby Alia, we learn about her father’s gambling problem and his involvement in some not so legal deals with people you would not want to be alone in a dark alley with. We see Alia at college as she tries to learn what happened to her dad, who he really was, and how her father even ended up in the UK to begin with(her father originated from Pakistan).

This story is filled with real life characters and events which made it all the more fun to read, this is one that grips you from the start as you become connected with the characters and find yourself wanting to understand what happened to Khalid. This is a very cleverly written book about corruption, migration and privilege. well worth a read.

Thank you Head of Zeus for sending me a proof and having me on the blog tour.

Thank you so much to the publishers for providing me with a copy of this!

I was actually pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed this book. It is such a unique story set between 1980s and the present. Think family dramas with an underlying unresolved mystery.

At the start of the book, we meet Khalid, an 18 year old from Pakistan, who moves to London to study Engineering. He soon discovers that his student income is not sufficient to maintain the high profile life that he desires. In order to earn more money, he begins to work as a croupier at a casino near Edgware Road, however he becomes involved with much more than he bargained for.

The book flicks between Khalid’s past, and the present where his daughter, Alia, is trying to work out what happened to her father after his is found dead under mysterious circumstances. I loved this underlying sense of mystery and it kept me guessing throughout. Through her search for the truth about her father, Alia also begins to discover more about her family roots.

There were lots of topics discussed in this book that did sometimes leave me feel confused and feeling like I’d missed something. However, I did really enjoy the way it was written and I loved that all the characters’ stories were interconnected.

I think this will be a popular book that will be enjoyed by many!! I’m really looking forward to seeing what people think of it!🥰

Our story begins in 1981 with Khalid Quraishi, a man who considers himself lucky in more ways than one. He has a beautiful wife and daughter, and a job he loves rubbing shoulders with the high and mighty in the glitzy Playboy casino in London's West End. It's a world away from his upbringing in Karachi, and he sees bright things ahead for him and his family. But Khalid is also a gambler, and his compulsion to play the odds in pursuit of that tantalising big win leads leads him into trouble.

1987 finds him with a broken marriage and desperate to recapture his dreams. When he is offered the chance of a lifetime to get involved with a business deal involving the creation of a new bank, he is sure that this will be the big break he needs. But appearances can be deceptive and this time the gamble involves some very dodgy business partners.

In 2003, Khalid's daughter Alia has only hazy memories of her father, as she saw little of him after her parents' divorce, beyond infrequent meetings at Underground stations around London. When he was found dead in 1987, after failing to turn up to one of their father-daughter Tube meetings, the police put his death down to an accident - although the fact that his body was dragged from the Solent was rather odd for a man who lived in the Edgware Road. This loss has always left Alia feeling that she knows little about the Pakistani half of her heritage, and how this impacts her own sense of identity. The time has come for her to find out what sort of man Khalid was and why he ended his days in a watery grave...

This is a book full of delicious surprises! It starts with the slow-burn of a domestic drama of a family torn apart by one man's ambition and inability to control his gambling addiction, and then heads off into a glorious twisty and expansive mystery thriller that delves into corruption, ineptitude, and very dark deeds.

Although the novel begins way back in 1981, the story primarily consists of two timelines - 1987, with Khalid's tale, and a parallel thread from a new MP in the House of Commons, Mark Denby; and 2003 when Alia is compelled to find out more about her father. The timelines swap back and forth building layer upon layer, until we begin to see the truth about Khalid's foolish naivety, and how he gets himself mired in underhand deals on a global scale through a chance meeting with Saudi businessman and arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi.

Alia's detective work drives the story, ratcheting up the tension and pulling you in as she tracks down the clues, confronts the complicit, and reels from the impact of what she finds out. The significant emotional impact of what she discovers is really interesting, affecting not only her view of her father, but also the way she sees herself and what she is due. I also thoroughly enjoyed how Mark Denby is used as a story device to shed light on the truly shocking scale of the corruption Khalid unwittingly becomes involved in, and adds a very cleverly worked element of tangible menace and very believable conspiracy to the piece.

The scale of this novel is immense in the way it brings is themes of identity; the driving ambition of immigrants desperate to leave their old lives behind, and yet tied to their heritage; the complexities of family dynamics; and a whole raft of political and societal issues. I was especially struck by the way Cordery Khan does such an impressive job conjuring the perfect feeling of time and place for every single part of this truly stunning debut. It's not just that she takes us from London to Pakistan and back again and across the different timelines so well, but the way she brings the complicated and contradictory sides of the late 1980s alive in these pages so authentically, recreating the brashness, the clash of cultures, the tense political atmosphere under Thatcher, the endemic racism and sexism yet to be addressed, while at the same time blending real and fictional characters, and pervading this all with the unmistakable sense that change is coming. As someone old enough to remember all this first hand, I am in awe!

This is a book that easily makes it onto the pile of my books of the year. Definitely one you do not want to miss!

From the very start I knew I would be hooked on this book - I loved the prologue and Khalid and Imran’s characters!
It proved to be a gripping and emotive tale of family and immigrant identity and experiences!!

Well-written and well-researched, this debut novel is also a great read, with evocative descriptions of 1980s London, and a dual timeline with a family secret at its core. Recommend.

This nook is the story of a man who ends up dead and his daughter who is curious about what happened to him. It's a duel timeline book and touches on issues like identity and migration, crime and corruption, opportunities, class and privilege. I used the phrase "touches on" deliberately, because mainly this is a story, and a pretty good one too.

The book has a huge scope, and does not seek to resolve anything too neatly, which is both clever and just slightly unsatisfying.
My main criticism is that (in the copy I had) the chapters were not labelled by date or by character, which could get confusing, especially as many of the chapters start out with using pronouns rather than names.

I enjoyed this story and thank NetGalley and the publishers for the free e-Arc I received in exchange for an honest review.

Edgware Road is one of those books that is very cleverly written. Yasmin Cordery Khan has done a phenomenal job tying in different timelines to the different characters in the story and actually making it work. There was a lot going on in the story and there was a lot going on with the different characters.
I thought that the author portrayed Khalid's character brilliantly. An ambitious man with stars in his eyes; what could possibly go wrong? His ambition sadly lead him nowhere.
As much as I did like this book, there were quite a few things that I didn't enjoy either. I felt that the author went too much into unnecessary detail - especially when it came to characters such as Mark Denby. I would have liked to have read more of Khalid or even more of Alia instead of Denby and unnecessary details regarding his father. I also felt that too much time and energy was given to the whole BCCI issue. Yes, it built up Khalid's story but only to a small extent. Realistically, for me, the bank story sadly hit too close to home.
I also found the ending to be quite anti-climatic in relation to both Khalid and Alia's stories.

The book strikes a chord who knew the area at the time. The characters were nicely built up but nothing happens for so long that you lose interest. I'm about halfway through and I'm struggling to finish.

What a lovely debut! I was immediately hooked by a tale that I find hard to describe (and is probably why I enjoyed it so much). This is best described as a part character, part plot-driven mystery wrapped up in historical fiction.

As someone who wasn't alive in the 80s and only has vague memories of London in the early 2000s, Khan's masterful writing made the 80s feel like a distant memory and like London was an old friend, full of life and character. I especially enjoyed seeing the multicultural side of London portrayed in such a warm way, without any of the stereotypes or undertones usually associated with those parts of London (and, if I'm being completely honest, it was the title that drew me to the book because of Edgware Road's 'Little Beirut' nickname).

Khan has an easy and delightful writing style, allowing me to easily get sucked into Alia and Khalid's world. However, there were times that Khan would segue into another topic in a way that I can only describe as jarring. I often felt confused and had to read back multiple times to make sure I hadn't missed something. It abruptly brought me back to reality, often taking me a while to being fully immersed in the book again.

I also enjoyed how Khan used Playboy's downfall and the BCCI scandal as the backdrop to this father-daughter story, with people whose names are familiar to us through history and the media interspersed throughout. All of the characters we come across, whether they're real or fictional, are interconnected in some way, providing us with different perspectives of the events taking place. I will admit though that I was confused by Mark Denby's perspective being added when it seemed to me to add little more than background to the BCCI scandal, which we could have easily gathered from Alia or Khalid's POVs. However, Denby's chapters were enjoyable and easy to read, providing insight into the life of a new MP. Denby's perspective did make sense towards the end with the blink-and-you-miss-it reference, solidifying what the clear (to me) undertone in this book that everything and everyone in the world is connected, particularly in relation to world events.

To summarise, this was a great read, one that I will recommend to friends!

Now for something completely different....and brilliant.
I had no idea that the start of this book would lead to a plot of international fraud, corruption and one of the biggest financial scandals of the 1980s
Yet it starts with a daughter hoping to meet a father who never appears and how we unravel where he went after he left his wife and daughter Alia.
How an immigrant Khalid Qurashi, who has been trying to make his way with work at the biggest casino in London finds an opportunity to move beyond bets on horses and slot machines to the 'big' time. But when the big time includes names such as Abedi and Khashoggi then you may find yourself beyond your depth.
I liked the side story of the MP Mark Denby and how his research (helped by his secretary) hopes to uncover the corruption of the BCCI which it seems is starting to cause concern.
There is an understated family rift building that leaves Alia scrambling to uncover the truth later in life.
Overall a very well crafted family story that widens its scope to an excellent investigative plot that combines good research woven through the various characters.

This was a brilliant read, delving into the lives of first and second generation immigrants settled in London. It looked at how they coped with life in this area, but more specifically how they fit and connect with previous generations of their family. There were contrasts between each generation and how Westernised further generations have become. The characters in different sections were not always connected directly and in a digital early copy that could become a bit confusing, especially if a section was set in a different historical time period. However, all were connected in some way and this became clearer as time passed.

We meet an eleven year old Alia at Edgeware Road tube station. She is waiting for her father and this is the first time she has travelled to visit him alone. Her mum and dad are divorced. Our first meeting with Khalid, her dad, takes us back to his youth in 1960’s London where he worked as a croupier in a glamorous club frequented by celebrities including Hugh Hefner. Khalid develops a love of gambling but can’t afford to play in the type of club that employs him. Instead he and his friend take a drive to an ordinary local pub and the bandit machines. I love the way the author describe the experience:

‘The two of them worked like factory workers, hands fluttering on the square buttons, feeding back the coins when they tumbled down. The tangy smell of copper and nickel rose up from the money, held by a thousand hands’..

They like to frequent Irish pubs, because.the people are generous for buying drinks Khalid feels a kinship with Irish men. This could be the kinship of the immigrant experience but Khalid believes it’s more than that. He likes to talk about the similarities between Sufism and Catholicism, but also how British Imperialism has affected the people in both India and Ireland. There are lovely descriptions of their early family life with Alia which could have been idyllic had Khalid stayed away from some deals that go wrong. As he starts to do work further afield they begin work with a Saudi Arabian businessman, but this is where there are risky deals and potentially dangerous situations.

In 2003 Alia doesn’t remember much about her father. Her mum wouldn’t even talk about him. So, when he died she had no reason to think of foul play. It was always referred to as a sad accident, but now twenty years later she wants to know more. She wants to understand the other half of her heritage. She starts to think more about his death and is suspicious of how far his body was found from his usual stomping ground. She decides to find out more and travels out to Karachi where her father’s family are still settled. Her cousin Nadima meets her at the airport and her grandmother has brought the family together to meet her. She feels like someone who matters here and she’s surprised by the instant loyalty they seem to have, simply because she’s Khalid’s daughter. This gives her a sense of belonging to a line or tribe, something she’s never had before. I loved the contrast between British society in the 1980s to the 21stCentury. It was also interesting to see the difference when Alia went to Karachi and where she feels she is accepted more.

Her father felt more accepted in an Irish pub than he did socialising with English people. Possibly because there’s a kinship from both being ‘their own little people in a sea of imperialist bastards’. I liked and understood this solidarity, that a shared enemy can create strong bonds. I thought this was an interesting debut, the 1980’s were so well drawn and really evocative for a child of that era like me. The intricacies of the relationships were another high point for me and I was drawn in by the different generations, how they were perceived by society and how they viewed the world compared to their parents and grandparents. I think this book is a great insight into being a second or third generation immigrant in the U.K.

4.5~5★
“Where do you find a lost father? In the mirror, in the sweep of an arched eyebrow, in the sheen of hair? In the echo of a phrase that comes in the night, passed on and learned.”

Alia Quraishi is eleven years old, waiting to meet her father at the Edgware Road tube station, which is near where he now lives. Her parents are separated and this is her first time making the trip by herself. She loses her only coin in the payphone when she tries to call Mum.

This is a complex story covering different time periods and different characters, not all of whom interact directly but who are connected in some way to the dubious financial transactions we eventually learn about.

Alia’s father is Khalid, whom we meet first as a young man, a popular croupier in London’s Playboy Club. There are real people populating the story, and although I wasn’t familiar with the scandals, even I recognise some of the names, including Hugh Hefner, of course. That always makes something like this more interesting. The author is a highly regarded historian, and it’s obvious from this that she is very much at home writing about these people, places, and times.

Khalid can’t resist gambling himself, although not in the big clubs, which he couldn’t afford. He bets on the race and stops in at a local pub with a mate.

“The two of them worked like factory workers, hands fluttering on the square buttons, feeding back the coins when they tumbled down. The tangy smell of copper and nickel rose up from the money, held by a thousand hands. . . .

Khalid liked Irish pubs in any case. You could usually find someone to stand you a drink in O’Connors, or in the Rose of Tralee further down the road. In Khalid’s view, Sufism and Catholicism had a lot in common. Imran knew his views on the subject and was mostly in agreement. The Irish and the Asians, their own little people in a sea of imperial bastards.”

I liked Khalid’s comparison of the Irish Catholics and Sufis as “their own little people”. An Irish pub seems an odd place for him to feel at home, but then he’s an odd sort of fellow.

He meets and loves his wife, loves his daughter, gets mixed up in some dodgy dealings which involve Adnan Kashoggi, the wealthy Saudi businessman, and finds himself in some scary situations. Khalid’s body is found a long way from his home, and the police decide he accidentally drowned. We obviously have our suspicions because we know the sort of people he was mixing with.

The story moves back and forth so that we see young Khalid and wife Suzie and little Alia enjoying life as a family, although they are struggling because of his gambling.

We also see Alia as a university student and later lecturer, living with a flatmate and becoming more interested in her background. She wants to know who she is, who her father was, how he came to London, and how he died.

When she travels to Karachi, she is reminded of her childhood. Her cousin Nadima and family used to live in London, and Alia was like another daughter to them. Nadima picks her up at the airport.

“The sounds on the radio conveyed the rhythm of something familiar, something comforting. The sound of her father on the telephone. “

They and her grandmother are delighted to see her again. There are countless relatives at the party for her. She represents something.

“To the rest, she was Khalid’s girl. No one here was interested in her as an individual – not in her PhD research, or her next deadline, or her daily worries. They didn’t want to listen to her account of the journey. Of course, they needed to know that she was healthy and well clothed. But they cared about her because she was part of their line, their tribe, and she was the living link to the man who was her father, who they loved, and for this reason they would do anything for her and in this there was something unconditional and anonymous. She could have been anyone, but because she was his, she mattered. She was their lost property.”

Jumping back to Khalid’s time, we meet a British MP, who has been warned by a constituent’s letter that there is some funny business going on with BCCI, a big bank. He has his own storyline which is where we see the history and the politics and the scandal of the day.

That’s all interesting, but it was the characters of Khalid and Alia I enjoyed most, and the contrast between their generations and the cultures and how people mix – or not.

It’s an ambitious book, well-written and thoughtful, and I think it’s pretty much achieved its ambitions. There is certainly more to it than I expected. I look forward to seeing how this is received by proper critics.

One disadvantage of reading a digital preview on an e-reader or Kindle is that the formatting demarcations and spacings are not always as obvious as they are on a printed page or PDF file. The author does introduce some sections with years, which is helpful.

Thanks to NetGalley and Head of Zeus/Apollo for the preview copy from which I’ve quoted.

This novel moves between the 1980s and twenty years later as Alia - then as a child and now an academic - tries to understand her past.
Alia’s father Khalid came from Pakistan to London and we learn what happened when he got drawn into a seedy underworld.
Woven in is the story of a Labour MP Mark Debby who is tipped off about the corruption at the heart of the banking community.
Cordery Khan weaves the storylines together skilfully and the 1980s world is evocatively portrayed.
Although the characters never quite had my heart, I certainly enjoyed this accomplished novel.
Recommended: a tale of ambition, corruption and a little girl trying to piece together what happened to her dad all those years ago.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC.

This book was compelling and well written, and my only wish is that it focused more on the characters and their relationships with each other and less on the technicalities; it felt like it was getting bogged down in the details a few too many times, which made it hard to press on.

Despite that, it was largely an enjoyable read and I appreciated the opportunity to learn about something I hadn’t previously heard of!

Thank you to the publishers and Net Galley for my free e-copy

This story is set mostly in London and follows Alia and her father Khalid through two different eras.

With the death of her estranged dad still on her mind 20 years later, his daughter find out if anything from his past caused his death which many believe to be murder and sets out to discover what happened to him.

We read about Aliya travelling to Karachi to meet her fathers family and find out more about that side of her family history

I also really enjoyed the banking corruption background, I used to work for a global bank for ten years so really got into that aspect.

I also learnt about different cultures and generations which I enjoyed. Learning about the history of different countries was great as well, you can tell the author definitely knows her stuff

I will be recommending this book and looking out for others by this author

I enjoyed this novel very much. It is well-written, with the narrative split into a number of timelines which works well, explaining the back-story and linking that to the novel's "present day". The characters, including London itself, its variety of inhabitants, and its seedy 1980s Playboy Club, and both "town" and "gown" Oxford, are believable and recognisable, perfectly captured, and coming alive on the page.

With many thanks to the publisher and to NetGalley for giving me a copy of the book in exchange for this honest review.

What a stunning book! I loved the writing and there were so many moments where it broke my heart. I can't wait to read more by this author.

I really liked this debut novel. I enjoyed the relationships between the characters and how Yasmin Cordery Khan weaved the 1980s timeline with the present day. It was an engaging and intriguing read with a satisfying ending. I loved all the London references and the city felt like a character as well.

I can't wait to see what she writes next and would definitely recommend for fans of character based literary fiction.

This was an interesting book but I struggled a little with the different timelines. The story came together in the end but not my favourite read.