- 12 - Girl on the Train

Author:
Paula Hawkins

Published:
2015

Genre:
Novel, Crime, Thriller

446 pages [German edition]
320 pages [English edition]

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This book was hyped at the Frankfurt Book Fair in 2015, so I bought it.

In 2016, a film has been based on this book too. *I haven’t watched it yet but I probably will later. :D*

Content

One of the main characters of this book is the 32-year-old Rachel. She is an alcoholic who lost her job because of that reason. She still takes the train to London every day so that her landlady won’t realize that she has lost her job and so that she isn’t bored.

While sitting in the train she always watches other passengers.

Every day the train has to stop in front of the same signal lamp and because Rachel always sits on the same seat she is able to watch the same house every time.

A couple she secretly calls ‘Jason and Jess’ lives in this house.

Rachel imagines a perfect, happy, loving live for them which she doesn’t have anymore because her ex-husband Tom has split up with her years ago. She still loves him and always calls him and his new wife when she is very drunk.

One morning as the train stops at the same signal as always Rachel sees ‘Jess’ kissing another man than ‘Jason’.

The next day, ‘Jess’ goes missing and Rachel is shocked.

She wants to find the woman, so she begins to investigate.

Rachel had been seen in the street ‘Jason’ and ‘Jess’ live in on the evening the woman went missing but she can’t remember anything because she was heavily drunk.

In order to find the missing woman Rachel needs to remember but for doing so she has to make a journey to her own past. But will she be able to do that or will she just resort to the alcohol again?

My Review

This book is written in the perspective of three first-person narrators: Rachel, Megan (the woman Rachel calls ‘Jess’) and Anna (Tom’s new wife).

In general, I love stories written in the first person. I love it even more when there is more than one main character between which it is switched during the plot.

In this book the different narrators especially are interesting because we have Rachel on one hand, who imagines the lives of the other two women, and the reality the two describe on the other one.

In my opinion this shows very well that at first view other people’s lives always seem perfect and better than one’s own but at second view everyone has problems and isn’t perfect at all.

The three women talk and think about each other very much and seeing the difference between their expectations and reality is very interesting.

Another thing I really enjoy about this book is the ending.

A friend of mine told me that she didn’t like it because it was predictable… because of that I’ve read some other opinions on the internet and apparently many people didn’t like the ending…
I personally find it very good and not predictable at all. To be honest, I was a bit surprised… xD

I really liked that Rachel’s story kind of has a ‘happy ending’.
I really am not a person who necessarily needs a happy ending to be able to like the ending of a book or a film…

On contrary, I kind of find it boring when everything is perfect and happy at the end…

But in this special case I find it really appropriated because Rachel’s story is so freakin’ sad during the whole book. She is drunk so often and she doesn’t really seem to know what to do with her life. Because of that, I think that she ‘deserves’ a happy ending. :3

This leads to a thing I don’t like about this novel.

[ sorry for this jumpbreak, I just wanted to try it out and I currently am too stupid to delete it again... :o
I hope that I will be able to delete it tomorrow... I don't have any time for finding the solution right now because I still have many homework to do for tomorrow... 💀
For reading the whole post just click on the 'read more' button below. :D
thx, and hugs from Leonie <3]

It is very depressing. Rachel drinks, awakes the next morning, having forgotten what she did the previous evening, checks her phone, notices that she has called Tom several times, regrets drinking, wants to stop it, drinks again, wakes up again and so on and so on…

I just felt so sad and sorry for that women the whole time that I really didn’t want to continue reading from time to time… :o

Even though it was depressing and it annoyed me, I need to admit that I still find it appropriate.
*I know this sounds silly, but let me explain. xD*

Being addicted to alcohol isn’t fun. It’s a severe problem which very often isn’t taken seriously in our society because everyone drinks alcohol and it just doesn’t seem as dangerous as other drugs.
Reading a story with a main character addicted to alcohol therefore shouldn’t be funny or pleasant because this is a real problem and it shouldn’t be trivialized.

lol, you all probably think now that I am one of these inhibited people who don’t want to have fun and who are against alcohol and loud music or whatever… xD
Well, I am not.

I enjoy drinking alcohol and listening to loud music too and I am not against having fun! xDD

Phew, now to the last thing I want to say about ‘Girl On The Train’:

This is just a thing I want you to know because many people find it very annoying, but I personally don’t really mind it…

he plot develops very slowly because similar things, like Rachel’s drinking, are repeated very often.

My Recommendation

To be honest, I don’t really understand why this is a best-selling book.

It is not bad and I really enjoyed reading it, but I personally

1. Didn’t like it very, very, very much and

2. I would have never thought that all the other people would like it very, very, very much.

It just seems less like a #1 but more like a ‘good to read, but okay not to read too’ book to me. ^^

To like this book you should like non-fictional stories and you shouldn’t mind them being a bit depressing. xD

If you like reading stories with a ‘happy ending’ *as I already mentioned* this one would be good for you. :D

[German Cover]

Hugs,

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💘💘