The Girl on the Train

Taking a look at the #1 best seller before the movie comes out

“One for sorrow, two for joy, three for a girl. Three for a girl. I‘m stuck on three, I just can’t get any further. My head is thick with sounds, my mouth thick with blood. Three for a girl. I can hear the magpies, they’re laughing, mocking me, a raucous cackling. A tiding. Bad tidings. I can see them now, black against the sun. Not the birds, something else. Someone’s coming. Someone is speaking to me. Now look. Now look what you made me do.”

Witnessing an extraordinary event from the passing window of an express train, Rachel’s life is about to change forever in this gripping, psychological thriller.

Rachel commutes to work everyday by train. The same train, the same route the same routine. As the train slows for a signal, she gets a glimpse into the daily existence of people in the houses adjacent to the tracks. She amuses herself by making up perfect lives for one couple in particular, a dream life far removed from her own.

One day, this dream is shattered as Rachel sees something shocking from her train window, something incongruous with her fictional life for her perfect couple. She feels compelled to intervene and becomes entangled in the events about to unfold.

From here, you follow Rachel as she gets herself inextricably woven in amongst the characters of the plot. She is convinced that she alone holds the key to the unsolved crime. But as somebody wrestling with her own personal problems, can we really rely on the narration of her dysfunctional life?

How can we trust what she says when she can’t even trust herself? As you uncover the mystery, Rachel’s own dark past begins to surface.

Rachel is way more involved than she originally intended.

Paula Hawkins’s writing style makes this book a fast read. As the novel progresses, it picks up momentum until you feel as if you are sitting on that train, gathering speed and heading towards a train wreck. The book switches between three narrators, heightening the suspense as you see the stories come together, interweaving right up to the dramatic end.

The plot twists away from you every time you think you’ve got a hold of it. Hawkins gives you just enough information to keep you turning those pages right into the late hours of the night.

As a busy university student with barely enough time to do all the required reading, it is a mistake to pick up this particular book if you have any looming deadlines. I found it addictive. But good news, you have plenty of time to read it before it becomes a major motion picture starring Emily Blunt in October this year.