This one was a tough read for me, for some reason I just couldn’t get into it and found myself skipping a lot. I don’t know if it’s because the story was a bit slow or whether I just wasn’t in the right headspace but it wasn’t one for me.

I needed time before I wrote a review for this title. The story takes the reader on a journey of prejudice against a young girl who dared to look different and didn’t follow the path expected of her.
We hear about the events before Orianna was arrested, charged and sentenced to 18 years for a crime she doesn’t remember yet vehemently denies. This is told through therapy sessions with a psychiatrist analysing Orianna’s behaviour with the intention of unlocking memories.
We don’t find out until the end what prompted Orianna to be released but when she is she has to rehabilitate as well as determine the truth.
Totally compelling, this will make you angry and bewildered, gripped until the final twist.

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

I love a crime novel and really enjoyed the twists and turns in this and the back and forth from then and now. However, the big 'twist' did not sit well with me and did feel rather cheated about the rest of the book.

This is my first read by author Vaseem Khan and I found it a really interesting read.

The Girl in Cell A revolves around Orianna Negi who has been convicted of the murder but has always maintained that she is innocent. We are introduced to Annie who is a psychologist and she is tasked with finding out the truth.

Wow, this book was such a ride to be on, and it gripped me from the very first page and I consumed it within a day, which for me is very good! The writing style was great, easy to follow and the characters were just immense.

The reader is really taken on a journey and we learn why Orianna is where she is and what she has had to endure.

I will be picking up Vaseem Khan's other novels.

Thanks to Netgalley, the publisher and author for allowing me an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

4.5 stars.

I absolutely loved this book. I was hooked from the first page. Orianna Negi, otherwise known as the Girl in Cell A, is convicted of murdering her father, a man well-known for his womanising and cruel ways. Despite her conviction, Orianna cannot remember a thing, and begins to work with a forensic psychiatrist to try and unlock her memories. She knows that something traumatic happened that day in her father's hunting cabin, but she cannot put the pieces together. When finally released, she returns to her home town, where she is met with suspicion and dislike, but she is adamant to uncover the truth of what happened. This book is pacy, tense and I couldn't put it down. Orianna is a brilliant character, and I felt really invested in her story. I also loved reading the psychiatrist, Annie Ledet's insights into what was going on in her mind. I was so invested that I did not see the final twist coming. I love books where the ending is so devastating and unexpected that it stays with you for days. I certainly feel this way about the Girl in Cell A. This book packs a huge punch, and will appeal to fans of Val McDermid, Chris Whitaker and Alex Michaelides. Absolutely nothing is as it seems!

A murder mystery with a unlikely amateur detective - the woman who was sentenced as a 17-year-old for the murder of her father. Her half-sister Grace disappeared at the same time - was Orianna responsible for that, too? Forensic psychologist Annie is tasked with treating Orianna for her dissociative amnesia. In a narrative that toggles through time, we see Orianna released from prison and returning to her home town to discover the real killer.
This was a masterful story - it kept me engaged from the beginning, thanks to the character of Orianna, who is obviously flawed but very sympathetic. Her return to her hometown is dramatic, tense and thrilling in turn as the story unfolds and family, former friends and neighbours either support her or stop at nothing to run her out of town.
But what makes it brilliant is the way Orianna's dissociative memory plays tricks not just on her, but on the reader.
It's hard to say more without giving things away, so I'll just stop there and say this book is worth reading, and will have you reflecting on how truth, lies and false memories can become so intermeshed that unpicking them seems nigh on impossible.
A dramatic murder-mystery on one level, this is also a thought-provoking account of the awful consequences of childhood trauma on a vulnerable young girl.

Wow this book was fantastic - the totally unexpected ending elevated it to four and a half stars. I thoroughly enjoyed it - I thought it was really cleverly done and that was before the twist - it’s one of those that you think you need to read again straightaway with a new perspective. Highly recommended.

'The Girl in Cell A' has been my favourite book I've read this year. For an almost 600 page book I read it within a few days which doesn't happy very often for me. I enjoyed the dual POV chapters which were set on different timelines and eventually married up by the end of the story. The plot twists I never saw coming and the ending had my mind blown and I had to re-read. It also had me wondering which version of events were the truth after being so set on what I thought was right. I would highly recommend this book to anyone and will definitely be reading more of Vaseem Khan's work in the future!

This author is new to me and I gather this is a standalone tale. It’s a masterpiece. Part psychological thriller, part present day drama, it’s superbly written and gripped from start to finish. Skilfully crafted with a dual timeline. One in the past when the event took place, the other is current as we peek into the mind of Orianna. Was she convicted if a crime she didn’t commit or is she just deluded?

This is such a multilayered story of small town obsession and twisted family secrets. It whips along and just when you least expect it, the direction twists and you’re left almost breathless by the unexpected. I loved this. Everything I want from a thriller, and then some. Wish I could give it 10 stars for taking me into a vet different world so convincingly. Brilliant.

This book totally immersed me in the world of Orianna.

It was compelling from the very first page.

An incredibly well written and gripping story of the psychological impact that humans have on each other.

I like the format of hearing from two different characters in two different periods of time.

The ending was fascinating, I didn’t see it coming although it was hinted at many times throughout the tale.

My only complaint is it was so unputdownable towards the end that I ended up staying up until 2am to finish it!

I highly recommend this book and would love to read more psychological thrillers from this author.

Thank you for the opportunity to read this book on Netgalley.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for this advanced reader's copy and the opportunity to this early. Review has been posted on Waterstones and Amazon.

This was an unexpected departure for the author of cosy and procedural crime usually set in India. In his latest novel, Vaseem Khan is in small-town America where we are introduced to Orianna, aka The Girl in Cell A, a young woman who has spent 18 years in prison for a murder she says she didn't commit.
Through the eyes of her prison analyst, in exchanges on the inside, and then her own narrative back in the town where she is trying to piece together what really happened, Orianna takes us on a winding journey full of suspense and twists.
This is a well-written and tightly plotted novel which keeps the reader guessing all the way through. Thoroughly recommended. Would have been a four-star read but I felt the novel was a bit too long and I struggled to keep track of some of the family members. But all in all, an excellent thriller.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for an advance copy of this book.

When an author deviates so far from what he is good at, great at, there's a worry that the change will be too much. but heck no - I love Vaseems' books and this goes down as being one of my favs. So well written, so compelling and utterly addictive. A thriller with a special place on the shelves for sure!

⭐️⭐️ 2 very slow stars.

I can see this has some very high star reviews but for me I found it to be a very slow burning book. The characters were generally unlikeable and hard to engage with.

The POV style I do usually like but in this case something wasn’t working and it struggled to hold my attention at times.

It's going to be difficult giving this lengthy novel five stars because it really demands more. It was just compelling reading from the first page, never dull, great intrigue and had sufficient clues for the reader to make a reasonal fist of finding the true killer. However, that was just a prelude because as I neared the end of the novel Vaseem Khan bowled a googly which immediately raised my hackles but I was too quick to judge. The lyrics to the song Windmills of my Mind seemed pertinent:
Like a circle in a spiral
Like a wheel within a wheel
Never ending or beginning
On an ever-spinning wheel
Yes, Vaseem Khan introduced a shattering enigma which took the whole story to a new level and the reader to a tailspin.
I really cannot recommend The Girl in Cell A enough, it is the work of a genius.

thank you to Hodder and Netgalley for my ARC copy of this in exchange for a review!

i enjoyed this thriller and it’s quite different to other thrillers that i’ve read. i was so confused at the ending and it still had me questioning what happened.

i reckon the book could have been about 150 pages less whilst still getting the main plot across. there were lots of characters to remember and get my head around so i would recommend reading this book in big chunks to fully grasp it.

overall, a good psychological thriller

Annie is tasked with trying to find out if Orianna killed her father when she was just 17 years old. She also wants to find out the fate of his daughter Grace, who went missing that same day and was never seen again.
Set in Echo Falls, the small Town America is portrayed to perfection. The insular and outdated views. The one family rule, led by patriarch Amos. This family is not without its own skeletons, including murder and incest amongst other things.
The story is told in two timelines, that or Orianna as Annie tries to uncover her lost memories due to dissociative amnesia. For Orianna is convinced she did not kill her father but had no memories of that day. It is then told from her point of view as she returns to Echo Falls after 18 years to finally uncover the truth.
The story is gripping and impossible to put down. There elements of such beautifully written prose. I could really feel the repressive heat, the forests, the claustrophobic town where everyone knows everyone.
I was convinced, at various points, that I'd figured it out. Ha! I was not even close. The ending twists your views all over the place. Which was miles off my original thoughts anyway.
It's also a story of family, of loyalty, how far you go to protect your family name and reputation. Its love and hate, privilege and envy. Friendship and who we can turn to in times of need.

This started slow for me, and it took me a while to get interested in the characters, but about 20% through the story really started to absorb my attention.

This is a 2-person narrative. Orianna, the girl in Cell A, from a small town in America, has been imprisoned for murder of a local man, and for being involved in the disappearance (murder?) of Grace - her friend. Orianna does not remember killing, or what happened to her friend Grace, but the evidence seems clear that she was the murderer and was involved in the disappearance.

The other narrator is Anne, a prison psychologist tasked with helping the girl to uncover what really happened, with the aim of getting her to accept what she has done, and for the family and town to finally find out what happened to Grace. During her work, she begins to doubt whether Orianna is really guilty of the crimes.

There are several twists to this story, and it's like a good "whodunnit", where you're left pointing your finger at first one person, then another - if of course you believe that the girl is innocent.

I found this hard to put down, and enjoyed the twist at the end, which explained everything and pulled it all together so well.

It’s a source of some concern to me that several of my favourite writers of novels and mysteries set in India have decided to write books about completely different places. I was intrigued to see how Vaseem Khan would handle the challenge of writing a whodunnit from the point of view of not one but two female American characters.

Would it be a compliment to his flexibility that I kept having to remind myself that this very accomplished novel came from the man behind the Baby Ganesh and Persia Wadia/Malabar House novels?

Of course, Khan is actually a British author and I can understand his urge to break out of his Indian storytelling niche, but I did wonder why he chose small-town America over a UK setting. That said, I didn't notice any glaring errors in the setting - but then, I don't know that environment all that well either.

He did well. Aside from a rather improbable leap from a burning tower, everything seemed to knit together very well.

The tale is of a murder in a small town with a dominant family influencing everything that happens in Eden Falls. A young woman was found guilty of murder and sent to jail. But did she really do it?

I’m not going to give you any clues. Too many books are spoiled by hints and this plot requires protection.

If you also review it, please do the same.