I loved how the chapters intertwined from one timeline to another to keep the suspension and mystery of what happened to Khalid constantly going. The story itself is very beautifully written and at times with such detailed descriptions, I felt like I was in the book with those characters, looking at the world the way they saw it, living their life and feeling the emotions they felt. Honestly, not many books make me feel like I am in the story together with the characters, and that is one of the things that made this book really stand out for me. In the meantime, Lord Denby a Labour Peer for Oxford East is tipped off about the shady dealings of BCCI bank and slowly unravels the questionable financial activities that connect an international bank founded by a Pakistan Businessman that has branches on British soil. A gripping family mystery with emotional depth and intriguing social context – Edgware Roadis a riveting, smartly-written debut. Sliding to 2003 (the narrative masterfully moves between the two timeframes) and Alia, now a Junior English tutor at Oxford University, is drawn to visit her father’s extended family in Karachi to discover what really happened to him.

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. The second narrative concerns Alia Quraishi twenty years later in 2003, who finds herself compelled to investigate the mysterious death of her father, who she never really knew. 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.

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The novel, which Khan has described as a love letter to London, pursues two parallel narratives, the first concerning a wonderfully vibrant character Khalid Quraishi, who is a croupier for Hugh Hefner’s Playboy casino in London, while his Pakistan-based parents still think he’s pursuing an engineering degree at Imperial. Of course, word count isn’t everything. A shorter book like The Sound Mirror uses similar techniques surrounding multiple perspectives in separate time periods with far greater success. The behemoth of a task ahead of him. (In fact the towering building, Capital House, commissioned the wry sculpture).

Khalid works hard and risks everything to give his daughter Alia the best he possibly can. The bond between father and daughter is a theme prevalent throughout the story. Khalid cuts an endearing figure. 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. 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. One of the three protagonists, Khalid is a Pakistani immigrant working as a croupier at Hugh Hefner’s infamous London Playboy Club. Shuffling cards by night, Khalid has big plans for his partner and daughter – dreams of Caribbean islands, diamonds and flash cars. However, despite knowing that the house always wins, Khalid has a gambling problem, staking his family’s future happiness at the expense of the present. A wide-ranging and affecting debut novel about family and identity, from an award-winning historian.In search of more shade, we retreat to leafy Paddington Green, which comes with the added bonus of a grass sprinkler. They and her grandmother are delighted to see her again. There are countless relatives at the party for her. She represents something.

The novel joins a growing eighties redux vibe in 2022 - a nostalgia that will appeal to anyone Alia Quraishi doesn't really remember her dad. After her parents' divorce she hardly saw him, and her mum refuses to talk about her charming ex-husband. So, when he died in what the police wrote off as a sad accident, Alia had no reason to believe there was more going on. And now, we reach the end of Edgware Road, as the Regent's Canal slices in at a right angle, and it becomes Maida Vale on the other side. Edgware Road is an anomaly of independent shops peppered in with giants, rather than the other way around. So you'll find the odd Tesco and Costa Coffee rubbing shoulders rather nervously, with far more interesting outlets.Is Khalid a small man thinking big or a big man in the making? Both, and all of it set up in that instance of fate; the rest unfolding as plot, not to be spoiled here.