The Spiral

A highly unusual thriller depicting the quest of a young woman to find the person responsible for a brutal attack on her. Mysterious and original, this will take your breath away.

Wow this book really will mess with your mind. With the mix of a researched trying to finish of her work and get an interview with a notoriously publicity shy author who wrote the choose your own adventure books she loved as a kid and then an attack that almost kills her. Things spiral into a crazy and scary world intermixed with a choose your own adventure story. This is total different as a read and I loved the nod back to the books I loved as a child. There is something really exciting about choosing where to go next in a story instead of being directed but ultimately the author controls everything.

I got The Spiral by Iain Rayn from Netgalley for a fair and honest review.


Erma Bridges' life is far from perfect, but entirely ordinary. So when she is shot twice in a targeted attack by a colleague, her quiet existence is shattered in an instant.

With her would-be murderer dead, no one can give Erma the answers she needs to move on from her trauma. Why her? Why now?

So begins Erma's quest for the truth - and a dangerous, spiralling journey into the heart of darkness.

The Spiral by Iain Ryan, in its simplest form is a thriller about people who have gone missing, and why Jenny, a research assistant, tried to kill Erma Bridges, the professor she was working for before killing herself.

However with the story being told through Erma’s eyes, who may or may not be the most reliable narrator, as she is being investigated by the university she works for.

Erma the narrator, of the story is doing research for a book, about books she used to play with hers sister in the 80’s were you read a section of the book and at the end of it you had a choice to make, eg. choose to go left or right or another maybe fight or run away, for example.

This style of the book is short of mixed in with the story as a whole as Erma has regular dreams of herself being a character she played as a child. In addition at one point in the book you as a reader play a short game, before continuing the story.

The spiral is one of those books that i think is going to divide reades, as people are going to love or hate it, due to the lay out of the story, this is because if you take out the chapters from the role playing game out, you have a really solid thriller, with well written characters and an interesting plot line.

But with the role playing sections in, it will turn people off The Spiral, but for those who enjoyed the book, it may be a contender for the best books of the year.


Who should read the Spiral? The Spiral is for people who enjoy an intriguing thriller, that takes the genre in ways that may infuriate you as a reader.

It is even for those who do not read thrillers as they feel that they are so regimented and formuleric.

All this means that Iain Rayn has written in The Spiral, a book you may love or like but at least you should read, as it does what all forms of entertainment does, which is make you care about it.

After hearing about this book for so long, I was finally able to read it, it certainly does not disappoint. It is a very original and unique way for a book to be written but it works so well, I have never seen it done before. The story is fast paced and engaging, there are quite a few twists but the reader is the one to choose which way the story goes. It is such a fun and interesting read, that I consumed it within a few hours and now want to read it all over again. I cannot wait to see what the author Iain brings to the plate with this next book.