Middle Grade and Mystery Thriller isn’t something I usually read together, but imagine my surprise when I read one and IT WAS SO AMAZING. Queen Of The Tiles by Hanna Alkaf narrates a story of grief, friendship, betrayal and revenge. Plus points for me too that there is a scene depicting a young characters’ understanding of consent.

The way Alkaf incorporated the game of scrabble amazed me a lot. I mean, I didn’t know it could be this competitive? These kids would destroy me by a huge margin for sure. The character relationships are strong, and the plot twists catch you by the throat.

Well-written a with a compelling plot, Queen of the Tiles will recieve a 5 star rating from me. I have now read two books from Hanna Alkaf and they both surpassed my expectations. That being said, I really really highly recommend this book to everyone!

Trina Low was the Queen Of The Tiles, the glamorous and hyper-competitive Scrabble champion who died abruptly and unexpectedly towards the end of a championship match when she was only 16. Her death scarred the lives of many of those around her, foremost among them being Najwa Bakri, her best friend and the girl determined to take over the title a year later on the anniversary of Trina's death.

Najwa has been silently battling the anxiety that has plagued her ever since that horrible day. She's fought her way back to a semblance of normalcy in the intervening year, and now wants to win the tournament in order to honor her best friend. It's surreal to see so many of the same people competing for the prize, each with their own view of Trina. But things only get truly weird when Trina's dormant Instagram account suddenly begins posting new stories, claiming that Trina was murdered and that one of them is to blame.

Mark, Trina's boyfriend at the time of her death, wants to team up with Najwa to figure out what's going on, but Najwa is hesitant to trust him. As far as she can tell, he's hardly been the picture of grief, squiring various other girls around Kuala Lumpur in the past year instead. Worse, his relationship with Trina had been volatile at best, with Najwa often bearing witness to their escalating fights.

But perhaps the real reason Najwa doesn't want to trust him or anyone else in helping her get to the bottom of things is that she herself doesn't remember much of that fateful day. Her therapist assures her that amnesia of that sort is common to those who've undergone trauma, but Najwa harbors the fear that she might have seen something that she could have stopped, and perhaps saved her best friend in the process.

Regardless, she's determined now not only to win the tournament but to figure out the truth behind Trina's death and bring a murderer to justice. Even as she fights her inner demons to investigate, she must slowly accept that Trina was not as wonderful as Najwa always wanted to believe. Even worse, she has to figure out who could have hated Trina enough not only to kill her but to possibly kill again.

Hanna Alkaf is my favorite Malaysian writer and this novel only cements that opinion. Reading this book was like being transported back to Malaysia, in the setting and language and all the little touches that reminded me of home. It also resonated with me as a Scrabble fan, tho in fairness I would not want to play against this author given the prowess on display here. As a puzzle enthusiast, I so very much appreciated how the ciphers in this novel were actually challenging, including the larger mystery of whodunnit as revealed in the finale.

Most importantly, I appreciated the meditations on friendship, as well as the emphasis on inclusivity. No one anywhere writes about mental illness the way Ms Hanna does. And as an ambassador for contemporary Malaysia, in all its hot Manglish glory, there's no one better at depicting the diversity and camaraderie and rivalry of characters who feel like they could have been the kids I ran with and into at Magic tournaments or debate championships (yes, I was a full-on nerd, but this is a book about <i>Scrabble</i>, for goodness' sake.) The only thing I less than loved was how Mark's abusiveness was not immediately seen as a red flag: friends and readers, if your romantic partner pushes you in anger over what you're wearing, they need to be dumped post haste. Otherwise, Queen Of The Tiles is unmissable for anyone interested in either word games or Malaysia or just a terrific YA mystery read.

Queen Of The Tiles by Hanna Alkaf was published April 19 2022 by Salaam Reads and is available from all good booksellers, including <a href="https://bookshop.org/a/15382/9781534494558">Bookshop!</a>

For mystery and suspense aficionados, Queen of the Tiles may be easy pickings with the culprit pegged from the start. For someone who tends to stay away from these genres (I get too antsy and want to read the end), I was intrigued from the very beginning. Like many murder mysteries, multiple individuals may have wanted Trina dead, possibly even Najwa.

Queen of the Tiles and the general plot isn’t particularly new. It even starts to feel like another cookie-cutter YA murder mystery when the Instagram posts begin showing up. The book was able to retain my attention because of the unique setting. It was a refreshing change from the normal settings of these mysteries, many of which have been at elite schools. Through the competition, Hanna Alkaf captures the general tone of The Queen’s Gambit (the series, not the book since I have not read it also please don’t strangle me for that) with players vying to be champion.

With the Scrabble tournament as the focal point, the writing shines through. When the plot began to lose my attention, it was the writing that continued to keep me engaged. The strategic use of words, the wordplay and how it was effortlessly implemented, had me in awe. The attention to detail, the understanding of how words matter had me enamored. The amount of research that went into the book must have been both immense and intense. It pays off here.

Individuals who enjoy YA murder mysteries and are fans of The Queen’s Gambit will enjoy the novel.

I’m incredibly grateful to Hanna Alkaf for her determination to give Southeast Asians priority access to this book. Being from the Global South, I would not have been given this review opportunity otherwise. Huge thanks as well to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers for facilitating my access to the e-ARC so that I could write this honest review.

⭐️4.75
CONTENT WARNINGS: on-page death, descriptions of anxiety / PTSD / panic attacks, discussions of grief and loss

This is the first book I’ve encountered from Hanna Alkaf, and after everything I saw, I’m determined that it will not be the last. Where do I even begin? The pacing was tight. The resolution was satisfying. The wordplay was spot-on, and purely, deliciously nerdy. The teenage characters read like actual teenagers — and the way each one carried on with their respective traumas and flawed friendships was not only realistic, but compelling. The atmosphere in the story was so unapologetically Southeast Asian. The setting took me back to my early teenage years. (Not Scrabble tournaments, but spelling bees and campus journalism contests.) The writing… made me feel so intelligent and so linguistically inadequate at the same time — and I love Hanna Alkaf all the more for it.

My favorite character, understandably, is the protagonist Najwa Bakri. I was so impressed by how she sees and understands the world around her: not merely through Scrabble words and their corresponding points — which would have made for an easy but shallow characterization — but also in terms of dictionary meanings, etymologies, and even the appearances of the letters on paper.

The story is told from her point of view, and the events are told in a nonlinear fashion. This might deter readers who prefer a straightforward narration — although the book is all the more charming because of it. Like tiles that are swirled in a bag before they are placed onto racks then spelled out as words on the board, Najwa’s memories are examined and rearranged, creating beautiful possibilities when in disarray, creating meaning when finally placed in correct order.

Speaking of possibilities, the mystery was for me the weakest element in the story. The list of suspects was limited to begin with, and as someone who grew up surrounded by Nancy Drew, Hercule Poirot, and the Bobbsey Twins, all my hunches at the beginning proved correct in the end. But that is not to say that I wasn’t kept on the edge of my seat as the story built up towards the big reveals. A small anecdote: I started reading the book on a Thursday afternoon. By 11PM, I publicly announced that I was already in the eerie parts where Najwa starts receiving messages from her dead friend Trina’s Instagram account — and that I was beginning to feel genuinely scared. Naturally, some of my book club friends thought it the best time to get my phone to ring with Instagram notifications. I barely kept from screaming, so I’m grateful to them for letting me feel the full spectrum of emotions that our main character must have felt in the story.

To end, a quick word about the rating: I would’ve rounded up my review to a full 5 stars, but I’m always wary of how Filipinos are depicted in contemporary fiction. My review copy of the book featured two: a fanny-packed contestant with an “unmistakably Filipino” accent [p. 105]; and a devoted Filipino nanny in Trina’s family’s employ [p. 38].

“I think about life within Scrabble at its center and shiver. Without this world, what am I?”

Najwa Bakri's best friend, Trina Low, quite dramatically died during a Scrabble tournament and Najwa has been a walking mess for a whole year and is still reeling from the incident. Najwa then enters into the same annual tournament, held in Malaysia, to win and honor her friend's memory. But when Trina's inactive instagram account begins to upload suspicious pictures containing clues and messages that lead to the suspicion whether Trina's death happened naturally or was a cruelly planned murder, Najwa decided to investigate.

I really enjoyed trying to figure out the clues and the diverse cast of characters was quite enjoyable. The tension flowed off the page and kept me furiously flipping pages and the ending was well done! i thoroughly enjoyed Queen of the Tiles.

[QUEEN OF THE TILES includes on-page death, panic attacks/PTSD, anxiety, as well as a significant focus on grief/loss.]

If fast-paced mysteries are your thing, Hanna Alkaf’s QUEEN OF THE TILES is definitely a book you should have on your radar. The bulk of the story takes place during a three-day tournament weekend, though the past—both the tournament a year ago, and various memories leading up to and after that—is always nearby (even if it isn’t always freely recalled).

I really the more meta aspects of QUEEN OF THE TILES. Each chapter begins with a thematically Scrabble-playable word, it’s point value, and its definition(s). Najwa is, as both she and other character remark on, one of the few Scrabble players who cares about the meanings behind the words they use to score points, so it is unsurprising she is one of the few characters who chases after the truth behind the mysterious Instagram posts on Trina’s account. I also enjoyed the presence of the amateur documentary makers and how their interviews/videos pushed Najwa along in her own sleuthing.

And there is no shortage of people with potential motives, ranging from rivalry to romance. There are enough people in the supporting cast that I was pleasantly surprised how many of them Hanna was able to develop over course of the book. These character development moments also provided a lot of insight into Najwa, especially as her own opinions of various people were revealed or changed over the course of the tournament. The characters and their relationships were complicated and made the mystery that much more interesting.

And speaking of interesting—I loved Najwa to pieces. I really appreciate when books dive into how difficult the grieving process can be. Even a year after Trina’s death, Najwa is still struggling to handle the sudden death of her friend. Her narration frequently references her therapist’s advice on how to deal with negative/intrusive thoughts, and of course returning to the same tournament Trina died at makes things more fraught. Najwa isn’t the only one grieving, either, though other characters deal with their grief in other ways. It was refreshing to have the book place grief/anxiety/PTSD/etc. at the forefront even while a mystery was playing out.

There were many Scrabble scenes in the book, and it is to Hanna’s credit that I found them incredibly engaging despite not being much of a Scrabble player myself. Part of this is due to the tournament being Najwa’s comeback, and so the audience definitely wants her to win her games, but a lot of it has to do with how confident and competent Najwa can be when she’s playing. It is immensely satisfying to “watch” Najwa dissect her opponent’s moves, drop Scrabble championship trivia, contemplate the meaning of the words she’s playing, and strategize what to do next with her tiles. (Though of course, given all the many things Najwa is dealing with during this tournament, she doesn’t always win. It only makes the triumphs she does have all the sweeter.)

Recommendation: Pre-order it now! If you enjoy fast-paced, contemporary mysteries, QUEEN OF THE TILES is going to be a great addition to your TBR list. Author Hanna Alkaf does a great job of balancing the Scrabble tournament, mystery investigation, and mental health aspects of the book, and together they form a compelling narrative for our heroine Najwa. The book releases next week, and you’ll definitely want to get your hands on it soon.

4.5 STARS

It's been a year since Trina Low died, and someone wants her crown.

A lot of people do, actually. When Najwa returns to the Scrabble scene after Trina's death, everyone remembers the Queen of the Tiles, for better or for worse. Trina's shadow looms large over the tournament, and when her Instagram page begins to share cryptic posts again, it's impossible to forget her presence.

But what if her death last year wasn't an accident?

Faced with confronting a trauma still raw, and vying for the title her best friend once held, Najwa has three days to get to the bottom of Trina's death. Every competitor could be a suspect, and every memory she struggles to recall might hold the answers. Who killed the Queen of the Tiles, and why stir matters up again now?


Everything about Queen of the Tiles is immensely clever.

I mean, it has to be. To play a truly competitive Scrabble game, you have to have an incredibly flexible vocabulary, ready for whatever tiles come your way. My vocab is halfway decent, but there are words in here I've never seen before, words that are, in fact, very real words. And these words are used brilliantly. Unlike other Scrabble players, Najwa considers the meaning of words just as much as their point value. It's not enough for her to remember the words that cost her a game, or the point tally that brought her to victory. What matters is the context, the history, the meaning.

And to drive this home, every single chapter begins with a relevant word and definition. The connection to the chapter isn't always clear at the outset, but it always combines with the content in clever, twisty ways. Each chapter is a bit like unwrapping a little present, and it makes it almost impossible to put this book down. What will the next word be? The next clue?

The wordplay really is on another level in Queen of the Tiles, and it's impossible not to get sucked in. Yes, even if you don't play Scrabble. Najwa has it right after all: it's not just about the points, or the game. It's about the meaning.


"But life, like Scrabble, is like that—you get the rack you get, and you just have to figure out how to make do."

Beyond the incredible dictionary dexterity at hand, Queen of the Tiles rocks because it's an engaging mystery. It's just the right amount of unpredictable, where the clues come together completely in hindsight, but every twist is another startling step deeper into the mystery. Najwa's characterization only makes this feeling stronger, as she struggles through all the tournament's challenges. It's already hard enough to win a Scrabble tournament, but she's here facing the very same people and places that surrounded Trina's death. Her memory is still difficult to access, a trauma response to the horror of watching Trina die before her eyes, and it's nearly impossible to decide who she can trust, especially once Trina's Instragram reactivates.

She's trying, though. With occasional support from her sister via text, and with a level of commitment that must be deeply difficult to muster, she takes what she has and marches forward. It may be upsetting, sometimes even dangerous, but she's determined to solve her best friend's murder, and make sure that she claims the crown Trina left behind. Her devotion is ultimately stronger than her anxiety, and she uses all the skills she has to push towards justice for Trina's memory.


This is a murder mystery that belongs on your shelf, no questions asked.

It's clever and engaging, and it's also a standalone. When the story is over, it's over, with no tempting fragments still waving at you from the final pages. The completeness of Queen of the Tiles is a major draw, and its sly use of every little Scrabble tile and trick seals its place as a must-read title.

Thankfully, there's not long to wait until its release! You can pick up Queen of the Tiles starting on Tuesday, April 19th. Make sure you do, or at least see if you can place a request for it with your local library. This book is a can't miss event in every way! And hey, don't you want to know who might become the next Queen of the Tiles? 👑


CW: loss of a loved one, self-harm

[This review will go live on Hail & Well Read at 12pm EST on 4/17/22.]

In short: I loved it! It was so much more than I expected: I went in expecting for some murder mystery but ended up also getting a story about grief, healing, friendship, and family. Najwa was a great character you’ll easily root for and the scrabble scene was really intense but we got to know some really interesting characters! Plus, I got to know some cool new words for my vocabulary so there’s also that. If you’re looking for some quick, emotional story about friendship and loss I highly recommend this book for you!

Scrabble competitions, set in Malaysia, and a murder mystery? Add that cover, and I was over-the-moon when I got my hands on an ARC copy of this one.

Najwa is suffering panic attacks due to the trauma of watching her best friend and Scrabble champion, Trina, suddenly die at the end of a scrabble match right in front of her. Although the death happened a year before, the cause never came to light. A year later, Najwa tries to regain a hold on her life and re-enters the Scrabble scene after a long pause. Of course, her first competition is at the same place where her friend died...and exactly a year later. As Najwa tries to come to terms with her own ghosts, she watches all her earlier friends feverishly battle to take Trina's place. But Najwa has set her eyes on that position herself to honor the memory of her best friend and is on the best way to accomplish her goal...until a real ghost takes over Trina's dormant, social media accounts and teases with hints at murder.

This book was as grabbing as I hoped it be and also took a slightly different atmosphere than I expected...and that's great. The first chapter begins with Trina's sudden death in a traumatic way. Najwa then hits the scene with chapter two a year later as she comes across insecure and awkward, and tries to force herself to re-grasp her life. The author has done a very good job at allowing Najwa's emotions, thoughts, and inner-struggles to gain a strong foothold in the first chapters. And while this usually would turn 'action-loving' me slightly away, there is enough going on in the undertones to start building the basis for the mystery and keep it more than interesting.

While Najwa's depth and warm-heart amidst her insecurity make her a wonderful heroine, the side characters can't be overlooked. Each one holds personality, quirks, secrets, and adds the right bite to form a rich atmosphere around Najwa and the intrigue. It makes it impossible to figure out who the true murderer is (and this does hit with complete surprise, at the end), while adding tension at every turn.

Then, there's the unique setting, which delights from all of its nerdiness. Najwa swims in words and understands the world by holding them close. Each chapter begins with a unique word, the point amount it gives in Scrabble, and a definition, which holds meaning at the beginning of the chapter. Her thoughts rotate around complex words, which she defines in her head, as she uses them to base herself and what she experiences or notices around her. It adds an odd and intriguing aspect, which gives this story its own flair.

This one is a treat to read. It does have a couple triggers as there is a death, panic attacks, and a bit of bullying, but these aren't anything harsher than even tween audiences can handle. There were a couple things surrounding the death, which seemed muddled over, and for someone with as much issues with the trauma as Najwa had, the idea of her rejoining everything at the same site on the anniversary raises an eyebrow, but this story more than works. I enjoyed it quite a bit and recommend this one to even tweens and up (although it is a YA read, too), since its such an easy, engaging, and fun read.

Queen of the Tiles is a young adult mystery novel by Malaysian author Hanna Alkaf. The story, featuring a Muslim teenage scrabble loving girl, takes place at a teen scrabble tournament in Malaysia as the protagonist, Najwa, tries to deal with the 1 year anniversary of the death of her best friend at a different scrabble tournament. The story is very young adult, but also very classical mystery in how it sets up a number of mysterious events, a number of well built out characters to act as suspects, and incorporates the theme of Scrabble throughout - something that really appealed to me as a very casual scrabble player.

And I liked Queen of the Tiles a good bit, as it dealt with a protagonist dealing with trauma and grief due to her best friend's death, who wanted to move forward with the game she once loved but struggles due to how its intertwined with her trauma....something not helped by other individuals acting in ways to bring back the memories. And the mystery elements (in addition to the themes of friendship, of love, of relationships and just how different people react to things) work pretty well, as the book manages to make every character believable in their motives and actions and personalities, which I really liked. The book's biggest weakness is its conclusion, which is horribly horribly cliched, but other than that, if you're looking for YA Mystery, you will find a lot to like with Queen of the Tiles.

-------------------------------------------------Plot Summary-----------------------------------------------------
A year ago, Trina "Queen of the Tiles" Low was all set to win yet another youth Scrabble competition in Malaysia....when, at the end of a match, she suddenly fell over dead.

Since that time, her best friend, Najwa Bakri, has found it hard to move forward with her life. Whereas once she was a top Scrabble player herself - thriving on victories even after Trina caught up and surpassed her - she has barely touched a Scrabble board since, nevertheless competed. It didn't help that some on social media accused her of somehow being involved in Trina's death.

But now, a year later, she's determined to go back to competition, even the same competition that once ended Trina's life. Seeing all her friends and competitors striving to be the new queen of the tiles, Najwa resolves to win the competition and the title herself.

But then Trina's instagram account starts posting cryptic messages, which seem to suggest something untoward happened with her death, and begins to DM Najwa herself...and Najwa finds herself distracted by the mystery: who is behind these posts and why? And is it possible that the posts' implication is real, that Trina was murdered, and if so....who was responsible?
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Queen of the Tiles is a story that works on two levels: on one hand, it's a solid mystery novel that offers up a number of possible suspects, each with their own realistic motivations that may leave you guessing until the end (my own personal first guess as to who it was turned out to be right, but I had second doubts 2/3 of the way through, which is what you hope for in a mystery). On the other hand, this is a story about a teenage girl in Najwa, and to a lesser extent the people around her, who is trying to figure out how to move forward after tragedy, and having to also recontextualize things that she thought she knew to be true about relationships (platonic ones mainly). And both of these pretty much work together really well.

This is helped by an excellent case - you have Najwa, the girl who is heartbroken/grief-stricken still a year later by her best friend's loss, and has needed therapy to try to move forward and is thus both determined to win and terrified of doing so this scrabble tournament in some ways, and who can be knocked off kilter by small revelations about Trina and her death. Najwa is our heroine, and its so incredibly easy to feel for her as she struggles through it all, and revelations make her question all that she knew about her relationship with her best friend - was it healthy? was it really mutual love? and even if it was, was she blinded by it to things happening to others?

Then you have a cast of others who all make sense and feel like real people and real possible suspects, who also have their own arcs. You have Mark, the former boyfriend of Trina and the protagonist's former crush, who might have been having fights with Trina but believes her death was not an accident; you have Puteri, Mark's ex from before Trina who was jealous of her; you have Emily, the girl who was caught cheating by Trina and now is hounded by that accusation; you have Yasmin, the girl who loved Trina so much in a one sided groupie-esque way that she always hung on her every move, and is bright and cheerful; you have Josh, the hyper-competitive scrabble player who seems to be an utter jerk emotionally....etc. There's a lot of reveals regarding them, as well as others I haven't mentioned, and everyone feels like the cast you'd expect around the teenage Scrabble tournament scene. And it leads to a bunch of emotional, character, and mystery development that really works.

Really the only thing that doesn't quite work in Queen of the Tiles is the ending - this is not a book that ends with a grand solve of the mystery by the protagonist, but instead has the antagonist decide to reveal themselves at the end....leading the protagonist to figure out what to do about that. And that could be fine (after all our protagonist is hardly Sherlock Holmes), except that the resolution requires one of the most cliche things of all time that I can't imagine the antagonist didn't realize. Like seriously?

But other than that, I really liked Queen of the Tiles, which I must also mention really does well by its Malaysian setting with the way the characters talk (and use certain words) and come from different backgrounds. It's a very excellent YA Mystery, and its use of Scrabble is really enjoyable to me, as a casual Scrabble fan. Recommended.

I was given a copy of this book in exchange for a review; however, all opinions and thoughts are my own.
The full review is available on my blog (https://eternitybooksreview.wordpress.com/2022/04/14/arc-review-queen-of-the-tiles-hanna-alkaf/)


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The Characters:

Let’s start off by talking about our protagonist Najwa Bakri.

She’s our main character whose best friend, Trina Low, quite dramatically died during a Scrabble tournament. We get to see and know post-Incident Najwa who is battling a lot of grief, anxiety, and possibly depression*. The book starts off with her deciding to return to that same tournament where Trina died so she can win the tournament in Trina’s memory.

*i am no doctor, but that’s what it seemed like to me; she may have also said it herself

There were a lot of raw emotions that Najwa experienced that I couldn’t help but feel as well. She’s lost her friend, her best friend, and she’s been a walking mess for a whole year and is still reeling from the incident. Who can blame her? It’s a horrible thing for anyone to lose their friend, but it’s even worse to see them die in front of you. She knows that she can’t continue living the way she is, and she’s trying to make a change, but that doesn’t make the journey any easier.

I felt so much for Najwa, and I was rooting for her from the start. When the Instagram posts started showing up suggesting that Trina’s death hadn’t been an accident and may have been intentional murder, I felt bad that Najwa had to have the wound ripped open again just when she’d started to finally let it heal. even though the idea of potential murder was technically the entire reason why I wanted to read the book anyway

There were a nice handful of side characters who were all in some way connected to Trina, either as rivals in the competition or friends like Najwa was. Personally, I felt like I related a lot to Yasmin because she’s the caretaker sort of friend. The one who’s always trying to make sure everyone’s okay and eating well, scolding people when they do/say things that shouldn’t be done or said, and in general, just Mothering everyone around her even though she’s the same age (or younger in my case lol) as them.

I loved that even though it didn’t look like she and Najwa were super close, at least compared to how Najwa was with Trina, Yasmin still looked out for Najwa and helped her when she got overwhelmed and had panic attacks. That was so kind of her and it made me like her so much more.

Most of the other characters I had a healthy suspicion of, and generally just didn’t really like. Mark especially, being Trina’s boyfriend, I really did not trust him. Not because I was certain he had something to do with Trina’s death, but it seemed to me that he just wanted to clear his name as suspicion fell on him, while at the same time repairing his friendship with Najwa. It didn’t seem like he cared about Trina as much as you’d expect.

Usually, when I’m reading mysteries/thrillers, I tend to not want to judge the significant other too much since everyone automatically assumes that they are guilty or involved in some way (especially if the victim is female). And statistically speaking, maybe it is true that there’s a larger likelihood the boyfriend did it. However, since that’s always the initial assumption, I go out of my way to give them the benefit of the doubt unless they’re just too shady to do so.

And well, more often than not with books, it’s the characters you least expect that are somehow connected to the whole thing, so there’s not much point focusing on the character that the author puts all the attention on.

In this case, though, everyone looked shady at some point, even Najwa herself, so it kept me second-guessing who really was as they seemed.

Also, a special shoutout to Tweedledee and Tweedledum. They were incredibly pesky and annoying (I imagined they were like twin 8-year-olds the entire time, even though I just now found out they are actually supposed to be about 13), but the fact that Najwa called them Tweedledee and Tweedledum for almost the entirety of the book gave me a little comic relief from the web of drama and mystery that this plot was.


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The Plot

Ah, the plot. In my opinion, 75% of what determines a successful mystery/thriller is whether the plot is believable and engaging. If the plot is a mess or it bores you to the point where you couldn’t care less how it’s all resolved, then the book has failed as a mystery.

The other 25% is the characters: for a great plot to work, we need a nice cast of suspects and a protagonist that actually does a good job of detecting for us. We can’t be in the book ourselves to find these clues, and being stuck with a protagonist who has no idea what they’re doing (looking at you Audrey Rose; it’s a testament to how infuriated she made me that I still remember how terrible she was in that book nearly 2.5 years later) is a special sort of torture, especially when the plot is actually interesting.

Thankfully, Queen of the Tiles did not suffer from a boring plot, nor from a useless protagonist.

The setting of the mystery was different from what is typical with YA contemporary mysteries. For one, it doesn’t take place in the US or even the West, and instead takes place in Malaysia which I loved to see! The inclusion of the Malay language and food references made me love the book so much more, especially as I had just been learning about nasi lemak and other Malaysian foods right before I read the book. I was so excited to recognize and know what the foods were.

- Quick side note about the Muslim rep:
There were some subtle references to Islam, what with Najwa and her mom wearing hijab, and also a mention of prayer. It felt really normal though in that it didn’t become preachy or go on a tangent to explain Islam/why people wear hijab etc. It was just a part of life that nobody blinked twice at, and I love that it was so normal and not the overwhelming focus of the book. -

The setting is also different in that it didn’t take place at a high/boarding school, which is kind of the usual setting, but instead at a tournament, and a Scrabble tournament at that. I liked the Scrabble element a lot; the new vocab and the love of words that Najwa expressed made me appreciate the game a lot more than I originally did.

As for the mystery itself, it was honestly so well done. Like I said in The Characters section, I really liked that there was a healthy amount of suspicion on all the characters and that the mystery wasn’t as straightforward as it seemed. The ending was something I did not expect, and I’m both disappointed in myself for not guessing correctly, but also pleasantly surprised by how it all came together.

I don’t want to spoil anything more, so we’ll just leave it at that. Be sure to read the book to find out what happens!

This is a book I didn't expect to drop kick me in my feels, being that Naj was experiencing her grief so strongly. As someone who is still dealing with their own grief, I think I needed to read a character who is working through their own and there was a lot of great coping mechanisms that were embedded into the story. I also loved that their was a mystery folded in so Naj got to use it as a way to motivate her & distract a bit from her grief. I also appreciated her passion for the game & her friendship. The plot twist definitely caught me off guard! This was definitely a worthwhile read.

At a high-stakes Scrabble competition, a Malaysian girl starts investigating the suspicious circumstances of her best friend's death, all while attempting to claim her title as Queen of the Tiles.

Fast-paced with a compelling cast of suspicious characters and an unlikely heroine, QUEEN OF THE TILES is a triumphant win for YA thriller and mystery fans. The story unfolds like a detective drama, while the undercurrent of the Scrabble competition and the persistent Instagram posts crying murder keep upping the pulse. With its appealing premise, binge-able plot, and diverse representation, this book is a must for any YA mystery/thriller collection. Highly recommended!

This book is about scrabble, started from an annual fierce competition to the sudden death of its finest player, Trina, then the tense and mystery continue until the next year competition.

The main character, Najwa, was Trina's best friend. She's shocked and traumatized because of that incident, but she still attended to the next year competition for Trina's sake. At first she didn't want to think about the past but then something mysterious related to Trina's death happened and Najwa felt obliged to investigate that matter by herself, amidst the nerve-wracking competition.

OK now my impression.
It's SO FUN AND THRILLING.
The wordplay is on another level of genius. Every chapter started with a word that I never knew existed until i read this book. Those new words-that-are-foreign-to-me also popped up throughout the story, but Hanna crafted them with the narrative brilliantly so it felt amusing, not confusing.

The mystery was so tense I needed to put down this book several times to gather myself before moved to the next pages, especially the last 25%. It was thrilling yet addicting.

The characters also very diverse with good representation. Sadly I think the dynamics are not really great because there are too many characters, and their traits are underexplored, so I can't give this book maximum stars. But overall it's a very interesting book and definitely worth to read.

Big thanks to Hanna for providing this ARC for Southeast Asian reviewer 💖

Mini Review: When I first saw the description (Mystery? Scrabble?!) for this book, I knew I had to read it! And I'm happy I did. This was an excellent YA Mystery, with a unique premise, and plenty of twists along the way. Overall, I would definitely recommend reading it!

I received an e-ARC from the publisher.

Queen of Tiles is one of my most anticipated releases of 2022. Combining a murder investigation with a Scrabble competition, I finished this in two days. The suspense story line had me questioning everything I knew. The tension ranged from outright terror to that subtle hair raising feel on your neck. When I say I had to keep reading, I did! As a Scrabble fan, this is a must read. Alkaf is able to merge the strategy game play with psychology - delving into what our words reveal about us.

I could go on about the cleverness of the investigation story line, because that's what made me feel like I had to finish. You know those books that pick you up and refuse to let you go? That's Queen of Tiles. But I think what I loved the most was the writing. Alkaf is able to not only use these scrabble words at the beginning of each chapter to set the tone - but also in such a clever way. There were so many passages that I just took a step back and appreciated.

What starts as a murder mystery quickly turns into a story about sabotage, secrets, deception, and letting go.

Najwa is competing in her first Scrabble tournament since the mysterious death of her friend Trina. She is trying to heal from the loss, but they way everyone is desperate to be the new "Queen of the Tiles" makes Najwa think there might be more to Trina's death. Then the mysterious Instagram messages from Trina's page begins...

I honestly love this book. It took turns that I was not expecting while staying grounded in some level of reality. Knowing how competitive these cerebral games can get, I can absolutely see these actions happening in real life. Each character feels so real and multidimensional. Even Najwa, as she learns to manage her anxiety, offers an excellent portrayal of someone in morning. This book is one of a kind and one I will be recommending to everyone.

I loved this, especially once things started picking up with the Instagram posts.

The story follows Najwa, a competitive Scrabble player who’s still grappling with and grieving the death of her best friend Trina, the Queen of the Tiles, during the finals of a Scrabble competition a year prior.

My favorite aspects of the book are as follows:
1) The characters: I found myself really enjoying the time Najwa spends alone with each character as she tries to figure out Trina’s death. Some characters were spotlighted more than others, but learning more about them was always a fun experience for me. I also loved the way Najwa would see Trina through the eyes of the others as she kept digging.

2) The wordplay: I like how Najwa describes the people around her and the situations she’s in with words. To be completely honest, I wasn’t a big fan of it at first (I felt like I was being pulled out of the story every time a new word I didn’t know was being explained to me), but as I kept on reading I learned to really enjoy this aspect and kept bookmarking the pages because I wanted to go back to the words.

3) The Malaysian and Muslim representation: The Manglish? The mention of Najwa having to push back the baby hairs escaping her hijab? The little things made me really happy.

I also really liked the discussion on grief and how everyone goes about it differently. That needing help is ok (and good!). And that the way we see and perceive things aren’t necessarily the only truth.

My only criticism would be the pacing at the beginning of the book. It felt a little slow at first and I’d sometimes put the book down to read/do something a little more ‘exciting’. I feel like that’s normal for a mystery, though. Once it picks up, it really picks up. And the end was a LOT of fun.

Such a great mystery! I enjoyed Najwa's journey through the grief of losing her best friend and trying to get back to being herself, even if she has to rediscover who that is. Her love of Scrabble, words, and their definitions was well done as an anchor. The use of social media as the avenue for her best friend, Trina, to return is relatable and the mystery that unfolds was fun to follow. As an English teacher, I loved the use of vocabulary words throughout the story and the love young adults have for Scrabble. Can't wait to get copies for my classroom!
Thanks NetGalley, Salaam Reads/Simon and Schuster!

I loved this book so, so much! I've been following the author on social media for years and when she announced it I knew I would have to read it. This book exceeded my expectations, it was really good!!