The Girl on the Train

The Girl on the Train

By Paula Hawkins

Riverhead Books/Doubleday January 2015

Genre: Thriller, Mystery, Fiction

Rachel is recovering from a terrible divorce, unemployed, and she turns to alcohol to help her through her pain. She drinks so much that she blacks out, and can’t remember where she was, who she saw or what she has done. She rides the train to London every day, she stares out the window and watches the world go by. At her old stop, Rachel can see her old house where her ex-husband Tom still lives with his new wife Anna and their new baby. It’s too painful to look at so Rachel watches a house close to her old one and imagines the life the people inside lead. She names them Jason and Jess and imagines they have a happy fulfilling marriage and have a glamorous life together. One day on her usual ride Rachel sees “Jess” with another man, and not long after that Rachel discovers the woman she knows as “jess” is really Megan, and she is missing.

Ok let’s start with what I liked about this one. It was well written in that I found it compelling, I had to know for sure “who dunnit”. The story is told from the perspective of all three women Rachel, Megan and Anna, and that did not bother me at all. It did sometimes feel a little bit jumpy but not so much that it was distracting from the story. It made the events unfold logically and you can understand more where everyone’s heads are.

What bothered me the most about this book were the women themselves. While reading this one I couldn’t help but sit there and go “WHAT THE HECK IS WRONG WITH YOU?” I could hardly stand Anna, the fact that she was almost proud for ruining a marriage irritated me. The fact that she blamed Rachel for all the issues between Tom and Rachel was shocking. Whenever the chapter started in her head I would groan internally, here comes homewrecker. She was the most paranoid of them all, and she was an idiot. Rachel I could not get behind at all. Did I feel bad for her? Absolutely, so much pain and suffering in her marriage. I understand giving into the pain, but you have to see you are ruining your life and pull out of it. Megan was selfish. I really didn’t like her either. Yes we all have experiences in our life that shape us but she was so busy covering up all her secrets that she came off as self-absorbed.

All these women were so CRAZY over men, and having babies. I am sorry, isn’t there more to life? There was sabotage, and being catty to each other over men. This pissed me off. The fact that the relationships between them were so awful made me mad. Couldn’t they just TRY to be good people? Perhaps that is naïve of me, but I don’t think that I would behave that way. I know that none of the women I look up to would behave that way.

Why did I pick this book up is what you are asking yourself? Well everyone said it was better than Gone Girl, so I thought I would give it a try. I didn’t really like Gone Girl, so I was ready for something better. I was ready for a very exciting thriller, a page turner. I did not feel that is what I got. I had my guesses at the very beginning of the novel about what was going on. Let me say that I was right, not on all the details or anything but what happened, oh yes, I was right. The only reason I felt compelled to finish was to confirm that I was right. I didn’t feel that it was a big mystery and I kept waiting for an amazing plot twist that I didn’t expect. I reached the end, it felt anti-climactic, and fell flat for me.

In the end, I just couldn’t get into the characters. That was a huge obstacle for me. Also I didn’t feel that it was that big of a mystery. Rachel was always making horrible mistakes and doing such silly things and it bothered me through the whole book.

My Verdict: You may enjoy it, lots of others did

If you liked this one try:

Gone Girl