The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins

3 "Don't Expect Me to be Sane" Stars

 

Back Cover Blurb -

 

A debut psychological thriller that will forever change the way you look at other people's lives.

Rachel takes the same commuter train every morning. Every day she rattles down the track, flashes past a stretch of cozy suburban homes, and stops at the signal that allows her to daily watch the same couple breakfasting on their deck. She’s even started to feel like she knows them. “Jess and Jason,” she calls them. Their life—as she sees it—is perfect. Not unlike the life she recently lost.

And then she sees something shocking. It’s only a minute until the train moves on, but it’s enough. Now everything’s changed. Unable to keep it to herself, Rachel offers what she knows to the police, and becomes inextricably entwined in what happens next, as well as in the lives of everyone involved. Has she done more harm than good?

A compulsively readable, emotionally immersive, Hitchcockian thriller that draws comparisons to Gone Girl, The Silent Wife, or Before I Go to Sleep, this is an electrifying debut embraced by readers across markets and categories.

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Okay, so this book sat in my queue of “to be read” books for a little while, but because of the often glowing and raving reviews that I KEPT seeing over and over again, I found that I wanted to be part of that “cool kid” club, the one where everyone had read the book and couldn’t stop gushing about it, so I stopped reading everything else and started in on it.  I should have known better.

For me, this fell victim to a little genre that I like to call “you have gotten so much hype, I really hope that you are about to blow my freaking mind” and of ALL the books and movies that have suckered me in under that category, only a few have ever really done it for me and this wasn’t one of them.  Don’t get me wrong, this IS a good book and I do recommend that people read it, but the less expectations you have for it, the more I think you will enjoy it.  Unlike a lot of books that I read, this one actually took me a few days to finish and I think that it was because of the hype that I had built up in my mind for it, because instead of being completely enraptured with it, I actually found myself pretty bored during some of it and I found that in order to keep myself concentrated in reading it, I would have to put it away and come back to it after a few hours. 

As for the storyline.  There is not a character in this book that I liked…not a one!  That is something really rare for me too, I normally have to at least like my main MC before I recommend a book, but out of the three women who narrate this book, I had nothing but a hate-hate relationship with all of them, but it somehow really worked for me while reading this and helped to keep me interested.  I don’t want to give away too much about this though, because even the slightest overview can be a spoiler and this is one that you just have to read to really experience what it is that I’m talking about. 

The Girl on the Train, doesn’t offer too much as far as thrills are concerned, but what it lacks in the “edge of your seat” reading department, it more than makes up for with suspense and anticipation.  In this tale, no one can be trusted, nothing is what it seems and every story has three sides:  what she says happened, what they say happened and what it is that really happened.  Was it Colonel Mustard in the library with a candlestick or was it Mrs. Peacock in the kitchen with a lead pipe?  My mind was constantly running through scenarios trying to figure out the “who done its” and the “why done its” and though I finally, FINALLY figured it out, it wasn’t till about ¾ of the way through that I did and with so many books nowadays being so easily predicted, that was a really welcome surprise for me. 

Overall, yes, I do recommend this book.  I think that readers who enjoy the mystery/crime genre will find a nice little mystery in this one and will also enjoy the writing style of Ms. Hawkins.  If you are more a romance or thriller enthusiast, I don’t think that this one will be your cup of tea and you may find it very hard to keep yourself vested in the story, but if you want to try something a little different, then I say give it a go.  I have definitely read a lot better, but I have also read a lot worse, but like I said, don’t expect too much and you might find that you actually enjoy it.

Happy reading, until next time…