About the book
At the school gates, Faiza fits in. It took a few years, but now the snobbish mothers who mistook her for the nanny treat her as one of their own. She’s learned to crack their subtle codes, speak their language of handbags and haircuts and discreet silver watches. You’d never guess, at the glamorous kids’ parties and the leisurely coffee mornings, that Faiza’s childhood was spent following her parents round the Tooting Cash ‘n’ Carry.
When her husband Tom loses his job in finance, he stays calm. Something will come along, and in the meantime, they can live off their savings. But Faiza starts to unravel. Raising the perfect family comes at a cost – and the money Tom put aside has gone. When Tom’s redundancy package ends, Faiza will have to tell him she’s spent it all.
Unless she doesn’t…
It only takes a second to lie to Tom. Now Faiza has six weeks to find £75,000 before her lie spirals out of control. If anyone can do it, Faiza can: she’s had to fight for what she has, and she’ll fight to keep it. But as the clock ticks down, and Faiza desperately tries to put things right, she has to ask herself: how much more should she sacrifice to protect her family?
My review
I don’t normally go in for ratings, but this was a 5-star read through and through. My adrenaline levels were so high while reading that I had to keep taking breaks to calm down despite being insanely impatient to find out what happened next.
There are few of us who can’t relate to the panic of a small, seemingly harmless lie ballooning out of proportion (although hopefully not to Faiza’s level!). Aliya Ali-Afzal demonstrates its domino effect so eloquently: the way one lie trickles down to another, the denial, the sickening anxiety.
I enjoyed how honest this book was. Money is a subject so frequently viewed as taboo – or at least uncomfortable – and it was refreshing to read a first-hand account showing the effects of how damaging lifestyle inflation, the pressure of keeping-up-with-the-Joneses, and simply not being taught how to manage money can be.
Woven through the story is Faiza’s experience and perspective as a British Pakistani woman with biracial children. As a Brit with mixed Asian/white heritage, I felt familiarity with experiencing a split cultural identity and microaggressions just subtle enough to make objections appear unreasonable.
Although Faiza’s decisions often made me feel like screaming into the pages, I still found her a sympathetic character. The pressure she felt to fit in with the yummy mummy culture around her was powerfully illustrated, and the reasons behind her choices were explored with a lot of nuance.
All in all, a zinger of a book that balances heart-pounding suspense with themes that are impactful and thought-provoking.
Author Bio
Aliya Ali-Afzal has a degree in Russian and German from University College London, and is studying for an MA in Creative Writing at Royal Holloway, University of London. She is an Alum of the Curtis Brown Creative Novel Writing course.
Aliya worked as a City head-hunter, before retraining as an MBA career coach. She has always lived in London, since moving there from Pakistan as a young child, but has also spent time in Russia (both pre- and post-Perestroika), Germany, Amsterdam, and Cairo.
Her debut novel, Would I Lie to You? was longlisted for The Bath Novel Award and The Mslexia Novel award.
Her work in progress, The Funeral Book, was longlisted for The Mo Prize Hachette UK, and is about 24-year-old Zara, who is planning a wedding at the same time as her beloved 90-year-old granny is planning her funeral.
Purchase links
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Twitter: @AAAiswriting
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