An interesting read with lots of twists to keep you guessing

This is a great start to a new series and author. Fast paced, page turner with lots of twists and turns. I was kept guessing right the way through. Highly recommended, I will continue reading any further books in the series.
Many thanks to Netgalley and HQ for an advance copy of Turn a Blind Eye.

I feel bad because I really didn’t enjoy reading this book and I couldn’t tell you why. It has all the right elements of a good crime novel, but for me something was lacking. I never felt I really got to know or like any of the characters and was left not caring who died next or why. The only person I felt any sympathy for was Roman and he was a minor role.

I am so pleased to have found a new author in Vicky Newham thanks to receiving Turn a Blind Eye from Netgalley.

This is an addictive read, I just kept wanting to read a bit more when really I should have been putting it down and going to sleep. I just wanted to know who the murderer was but I found it impossible to guess.

This novel is so authentic in every way with Newham describing school life in the ethnic diversity of Tower Hamlets and all the problems that can bring within the community and within an individual's home or employment. This diversity continued within the police team too throwing up the challenges faced by different races in other counties too. I learnt so and I just couldn't fault it.

I understand that there will be more D.I. Rahman books in the future and I for one cannot wait.

This is the fast-paced debut case of Metropolitan Police Officers DI Maya Rahman, mid thirties, Bangladeshi-born and raised in East London and her sidekick, Irish-born Australian Dan Maguire. They are investigating a series of brutal murders at a multi-cultural school in London‘s Tower Hamlets, where dozens of different nationalities, ethnicities, religions and cultures clash and lie in the heart of this murder puzzle.
Having been a psychology teacher and lived in East London, the author expertly addresses timely issues of inequality, immigration, mixed-race families, differences of cultures and their lifestyles and how profoundly they affect people‘s everyday lives. I would like to thank HQ and NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to read ‘Turn A Blind Eye’ by Vicky Newham in exchange for my honest and unbiased review.

Excellent. Original and compelling and apparently coming to TV screens soon. I can't wait to watch it.

I would like to thank HQ and NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to read ‘Turn A Blind Eye’ by Vicky Newham in exchange for my honest and unbiased review.
DI Maya Rahman is newly returned from the funeral of her brother when, together with her Australian sergeant Dan Maguire, they’re called to Mile End High School in East London. The Head Teacher, Linda Gibson, has been found strangled in her office and a piece of card left nearby on which is written the second ancient Buddhist precept ‘I shall abstain from taking the ungiven’.
Maya hopes this murder is a one-off but then another body is found with the third Buddhist precept printed on a card ‘I shall abstain from sexual misconduct’. Has there been a murder that’s been missed with the first precept? Can they catch the killer before any other victims are found? It’s imperative for Maya to solve this murder as she feels an attachment to the school having attended there when she first arrived in London as a child.
‘Turn A Blind Eye’ has been written with empathy and a great understanding of people of different religious beliefs. It touches on arranged marriages and the problems modern young women of today face when their parents decide whom they should marry. I like the descriptive phrasing used especially when black snow clouds are described as ‘hanging like baggy trousers’. In fact, I like everything about this novel. It’s exciting, tense, gripping, has likeable characters, a well-thought-out plot, and an ending that I wasn’t expecting. This is a remarkable debut novel by Vicky Newham and I’m really looking forward to reading the next one.

Good book, lots of twists and turns throughout and one that keeps you guessing!

I liked this book and look forward to reading future books by Vicky Newman. Especially the next book in the DI Maya Rahman series.

I like the setting in a school. The author has captured so much about the life and workings of a modern secondary school. The school politics provide an interesting and unusual backdrop in this fast paced murder thriller.

The sense of racial tension is present throughout this novel. The plot lines are enticing from the start. I was kept guessing right to the end.

My thanks go to Netgalley and HQ books for a copy in exchange for this review.

Although there is much refreshing abt this police novel set on our heroine's two home turfs - both in Bangladesh and in England where she is a DI, its movements in time and place despite some marking out of dates and place become too confusing early on - I was never sure where I was. so I had to keep checking... Maya, the police DI, had a dutiful brother who was a rebel against Islam and bullying and thgt returning to Pakistan would ease that - but instead he ran against local wishes and found himself executed - the book opens with her returning to bury him and discovering that other instances of bullying also occurred in the secondary school she attended in UK - she is investigating a case immediately on her return of a inexplicable death of the head of school, a vital young woman - but as she looks into it, and politics of the police force around her , the situation deteriorates and becomes something other than it looks like on surface. intriguing development just hard to follow - refreshing set of people..

An unusual,intriguing,complex murder story. This was a story set in a world I know little about but it kept me intrigued throughout and I really wasn't sure whodunit! Likeable characters with their own back story.. A good read.x

This book had me gripped from the first chapter. Full of twists and turns the story was told expertly with a surprise at the end. I didn't guess the killer at all as the story was so intricately woven anyone of the characters could have been the guilty party. Characters were believable and story could quite easily have been true. Bang up to date with issues that affect our daily lives.

Highly recommended - given this five stars and will continue reading any further books in the series.

A very competent police procedural set in London’s East End. The senior managers at a local comprehensive are being murdered and it is down to DI Maya Rahman and her colleague Dan to find out who is the murderer.

There is a strong emphasis on the location of the novel and what it is like to live and work in East London as experienced by a Bangladeshi female and an Australian male. If I have one criticism it sometimes felt like I was reading a dissertation on the cultural make-up of the area.

I received a complimentary copy of the book from NetGalley and publisher in exchange for an honest review. Thank you

Excellent story line and great main characters. I really enjoyed this book. I would recommend.

Turn A Blind Eye by Vicky Newham is an intelligent and confident debut and DI Maya Rahman is a character who will keep crime fans coming back for more. Vicky has created a complex case for her character to get to grips with in her first novel. This book is perfect for fans of Sarah Hilary’s Marnie Rome series.

In her first novel, Vicky Newham introduces us to Bangladeshi-born Maya Rahman who is a detective inspector working in the metropolitan police. Set in East London, Maya and her team are called in when the body of a well-known and beloved headmistress is discovered at Mile End High School which also happens to be Maya’s old school. The school has been praised for opening its doors to the wider community in East London, so what has gone so disastrously wrong? But what is all the more perplexing to Maya is the murder’s links to the Buddhist community and the cryptic clues left by the killer. Is the headmistress’s murder also linked to the suicide of a young girl from the school, which took place months before and are there more murders about to take place? What can Maya do to prevent another one from happening?

After reading Turn A Blind Eye, I know I am going to be putting Vicky Newham’s next novel straight to the top of my reading pile. There is a real sense of authenticity that she gives to her characters and to the setting, an area that she appears to know impeccably well. There were some strong, vivid images in this book, which really gave me the feeling as though I was there; I could see the streets and the characters forming around me so clearly. I’m a huge fan of writing that draws you into the setting and Vicky Newham definitely succeeds at this.

Maya was a fascinating character to get to know. Vicky has given Maya an intriguing backstory which has made me want to find out more about her roots, it’ll be interesting to see how Vicky develops this plot line in future books. Maya’s sidekick, Dan Maguire is also a character who I would like to find out more about. I really liked his personality in the book; there were times when he lightened up the prose and I really liked his humour.

I’m really excited to see what Vicky Newham comes up with next for Maya and her team. This is a really promising debut which will thrill crime lovers.

An interesting background of a school, modern society and culutural differences carries this police procedure novel along at a good pace. Short chapters and different points of view add to the plot's progress right through to a bundle of evidence coming together for a satisfactory conclusion.

I would like to thank Netgalley and HQ for an advance copy of Turn a Blind Eye, the first novel in a projected series to feature DI Maya Rahman of the Met.

Maya is just back from burying her brother in Bangladesh when she is called in to investigate the murder of Linda Gibson, headteacher of Maya's old school, Mile End High School, who was strangled in her office, bound and displayed, a Buddhist precept, "I shall abstain from taking the ungiven" printed on a card and left by her body.

I enjoyed Turn a Blind Eye which is as much a novel about the issues and politics surrounding multiculturalism as it is a police procedural. The hunt for the killer is interesting and well done as Maya and her team don't really have much idea about the perpetrator or his motivation until almost the end of the novel. The issues raised which I don't want to say anything about because they don't become apparent until the second half of the novel are real and valid but could have been dealt with more incisively by the author.

I must admit that I found the school politics boring and while they are a relevant avenue of investigation for Maya and her team the unbelievable refusal of the school management to cooperate gives them an importance they probably don't deserve. It's no surprise that Ms Newham is a former teacher.

It is interesting that the author chooses to make her two maintain protagonists outsiders. DI Maya Rahman came to the UK from Bangladesh aged 4 and DS Dan Maguire is Australian. I don't think, in this case, however, that it adds much to the novel apart from the odd moment of soul searching. More important is that they are both smart, dedicated detectives with their heads screwed on.

The format of the novel makes for a choppy read. There are 3 main narrators with each chapter being helpfully labelled with the narrator's voice and the date as Maya's first person narrative slips between her past and the present. The other two third person points of view are Dan and new teacher (another outsider), Steve. Steve's voice is rather redundant and could easily have been inserted into the other narratives but obviously reflects the author's interests.

Turn a Blind Eye is a solid début which I can recommend.

I absolutely loved this book.

Great storyline, characters that not only could you engage with but actually liked and could empathise with as well.

Thought the way the story was played out was very interesting, especially with the lead detective's connection to the school and also the area.

The book did not shy away from some of the issues faced in an area which is multi-cultural, and dealt with them very honestly.

One very small criticism, and could have been the way my kindle downloaded the book, but I found it seemed to jump in parts. For example the first victim's husband seemed to have to be taken to hospital when he is told of her death, but not told it, I just assumed it. Same when a suspect is said to have been caught in a lie about his alibi, we just get the sentence "I told you I got the day's mixed up" When did you tell them as I couldn't find it?

Would still highly recommend this book and look forward to reading more by this author..

I really liked this fast paced thriller. The storyline was so good that I couldn’t put it down. The characters in it were excellent. Highly recommended.

Many thanks to Netgalley and Vicky Newman for a copy of this book. I agreed to give my unbiased opinion voluntarily.

What a brilliant book. The plot was excellent and kept me guessing all the way through. Very original and I loved how difference and diversity was looked at throughout the book. Definitely add this to the reading pile