A crazy story but so well written. Heart breaking in the journey to the end of the book as you experience the different pain that Theo and Charlie had experienced. This book was gripping.

This was a fantastic high concept read.
I love a good time loop story and this was it.
Charlie was my favourite character, I didn’t like Theo until the very end.

This is my favourite Cameron Ward book yet. What a ride!

I don't want to say too much for fear of giving away spoilers, but this was a pacy and intense thriller with a cleverly constructed structure which pivoted around a mother's love for her son. I read it in only two sittings because I found it hard to put down, and really enjoyed both the fact the current storyline is set on board a plane and the references to maths/quantum physics. It was well written and the ending was so satisfying, in every respect.

I'm very much looking forward to reading Cameron's next book, but am not sure how they'll top this!

With thanks to Netgalley, the author and the publisher for the ARC.

From reading the description i knew i had to read this book. Spiral was a intriguing thriller/mystery that quickly drew me in and once i started i couldn't stop. Airplane setting books are always my favourite to read and this book is definitely in the top list, suspense and always on the edge, i enjoyed this book so much.

Spiral follows Charlie who is on board a plane where her estranged son Theo is the pilot, she wanted to surprise him and try and get their relationship back on good terms. However during the flight the plane fails and crashes killing everybody on board. In a twist Charlie wakes up an hour before said crash and now she has to figure out what she can do and can she stop the crash from happening? From the get go i rooted for Charlie and hoped she would be able to come out of all this safe and save everybody.

I do love a time travel book and especially flight books and Spiral ticked every single one of them. So much tension and twists and turns that will have you on the edge of your seat. I really enjoyed the characters in the book, the plot was fast paced and unique with unexpected moments but a excited and fun read that i would definitely recommend to everybody.

A solid five stars, many thanks to NetGalley, the publishers and Penguin Random House for the copy of this arc in exchange of my full honest review.

I asked to review Spiral several months before release date as the summary intrigued me. However after reading 25% I gave up as it seemed to be a book of 2 parts. The first appeared as 'Groundhog Day Takes Off' and the second a storyline like a 1950s Gangster B Movie. 24 hours later I'd had a rethink and went back to reviewing.
I'm so glad I did as I loved the book. The reiterations of the last hour of the flight are very tense and very well written. The prequel storyline has to be there to explain why things happened when they did.
Was the ending what I expected - No. It does make sense though.
So, please try to read this book - it is excellent.

Mother, Charlie, is estranged from her son, Theo. She wants to make amends and boards the plane he’s piloting. It spirals out of control then it’s Groundhog Day as events repeat. It’s a bit of a mixed bag; I didn’t like Theo and at times, the switch in timeline and characters was a little confusing. But the story has legs and it’s reasonably fast paced with tension and sufficient intrigue to hold my attention. It’s an interesting premise and bit by bit the story unfolds. Clever but somehow it just lacks brilliance. Enjoyed it though.

This was a really enjoyable read about a mother who will do anything for her son and after loosing him due to a long kept secret her life is turned upside down when she takes a flight to LA. As she wakes up from a sleep she is thrown into a nightmare that doesn’t make sense and it’s a race against time to find out the truth and fix things before she looses her son for ever. I can’t say any more without spoiling this one but it’s a very clever read.

A very interesting concept but not executed as well as it could have been.
Charlie, a single mother, has become estranged from her son, Theo, when he left to work in LA and to try and find the father he has never known and whom his mother always denied existed. Charlie takes a flight to LA to find Theo, boarding the flight that he is first officer on. Just before the flight is due to land it goes into shakes and shudders and nose dives towards earth. Charlie wakes to find the same scenario happening again - and she needs to stop it or a plane full of passengers will crash.
Charlie's chapters are interspersed with Theo's time in LA and it is here that I found the book was losing me. Theo comes across as selfish, spoilt and childish. Despite the best efforts of his girlfriend, Laura, and another woman, Anna, he blithely thinks he knows best and gives them no credit. I lost patience with him very early on but kept going with Charlie who managed to deduce a little more of what was happening with each time loop.
As I say, the concept is good but I didn't like the characters that much. The ending had a lot to redeem it though. I thought it was a fitting ending.
With thanks to Netgalley and Penguin Random House for an early copy in return for an honest review.

Fast paced thriller with a “Groundhog Day” storyline that takes place on board an airplane with flashbacks to the events that put all on board in danger. Single mum Charlie is the one person that can save them if only she can work out why her pilot son, unaware of her presence on the plane, is seemingly sabotaging the flight. The story flips back and forward in time but manages to be both engaging and (despite some scientific theories of what the heck’s going on) straightforward enough to make for a really compelling and enjoyable read.

Charlie, a single mother, is estranged from her pilot son Theo.
Charlie surreptitiously catches Theo's flight from London so she can meet him and get their relationship back on track. During the flight, Charlie experiences a plane crash, but them wakes up and it is an hour earlier again. This goes on a few times as Charlie works out what is going on, and the reader finds out what happened between Theo and Charlie to get to this point. Cleverly done.

This was so good, I really did not know where we were going. The spiralling story line was intense

I really felt for the mother, she did everything in her son’s entire life to protect him.

A great read for summer 2024!

It's clever. It's a gripper. It's a page-turner. It's an easy-read. It's got twists. You don't see the ending.

I enjoyed it.

Cameron Ward has done it again, another amazing psychological thriller.
For me this was not as pleasant as the others, a difficult read.
It is however well written with good characters, and interesting plot(s).
I liked it though and recommend it to everyone.
My thanks to the author for the pleasure that the book has brought me, I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

A fabulously written gripping story that was a pleasure to read. I would absolutely recommend this book, it was brilliant

I really enjoyed this, it was super interesting different and had some amazing time travel involved. I really liked the character and enjoyed seeing how their life’s changed and what happened to them.
This was different to any other book I’ve read which I loved.
Full review on good reads.

Charlie is estranged from her adult son Theo after he fled to LA a year ago to find his father. Desperate to reconnect, she books a seat on a flight where he is the first officer. But as the flight is about to arrive at LA, the engine suddenly fails and the plane crashes, killing everybody on board. Then Charlie awakes again slightly under an hour before the crash - but what can she do to stop it? I enjoyed Cameron Ward's earlier thriller A Stranger on Board and I was attracted by the time-loop concept of Spiral, reminiscent of films like Source Code. Unfortunately, I was a bit disappointed. I found Charlie difficult to relate to for much of the novel as she takes so long to get it together - she soon works out she has limited time to solve this problem, and yet she still wastes time chatting to fellow passengers and doing random things like accepting drinks from the flight attendant. I imagine that Ward was trying to portray her disorientation and disbelief at being plunged into this situation, and that would have been fine first time round, but it was dragged out too long. I also found it unbelievable that she is supposedly a gifted mathematician and yet struggles to understand the basic physics of space-time: again, Ward probably wanted an excuse to explain it to the reader, but I would have given her a different academic speciality (she wouldn't need a maths degree to know the Fibonacci sequence). The structure of the novel was also frustrating, with Charlie wandering off into random flashbacks in the middle of her chapters - which again, gave the impression that she was sitting around thinking rather than doing. I also very quickly lost sympathy with Theo in his earlier thread, where he came across as incredibly naive and selfish - poor Laura! I did very much like the conclusion of Spiral, where things finally come together and Charlie comes into her own, but my overall sense was that this had the potential to be much better than it was.

I'd like to extend my appreciation to NetGalley for granting me the opportunity to delve into this book in exchange for an honest review.

Spirals takes readers on a gripping journey, skillfully blending elements of suspense and mystery. Charlie finds herself aboard a flight piloted by her estranged son, hoping to surprise him. However, their reunion is thwarted by a tragic crash. Yet, Charlie inexplicably wakes up an hour before the disaster, trapped in a recurring cycle. The Groundhog Day-esque narrative keeps readers on the edge of their seats, eagerly anticipating each twist and turn. Can Charlie truly alter the fate of the plane and save everyone onboard?

The narrative structure, seamlessly weaving between past and present, heightens the sense of intrigue. As the pieces of the puzzle gradually fall into place, the story unfolds with a natural fluidity, keeping readers engaged until the final revelation.

Oohhhh I do love me a good time travel back and this one does it very well!

I had a lot of fun reading this and look forward to more

Wow, what a book.

Loved everything about this, the dual timelines, the mob crime background and how most of it was all set on a flight which is different from any other thriller I’ve read.

Would definitely recommend

A solid follow-up to A Stranger on Board by Cameron Ward. The time loop aspects worked really well and created a pacy story. I wasn't 100% sure on some of the characters and parts were far-fetched, but all in all a good holiday read!