Introduction: The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins
The Girl on the Train
by Paula Hawkins has been one of the most recommended books over the past six months. I bought my copy a few months ago and just got around to reading it. When I saw the name of the book, Strangers on a Train
by Patricia Highsmith came to mind, although the stories are very different. I think Highsmith’s book is a bit darker than this one.
The Girl on the Train is well-written, I enjoyed and I recommend it, but I didn’t love it the way that so many people do. Any book that tells a story from multiple points of view, I find very tiresome, so it has nothing to do with The Girl on the Train, it’s me and my personal preference.
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What’s Your Obsession? Review of Patricia Highsmith’s Strangers on a Train
The Story: The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins
At the start of the story, I did not like the main character, Rachel, but as it progresses, I learn to appreciate her, but still don’t like her. I like that she evolves as a person by the end of the book. Rachel is a divorcee, an alcoholic, who has low self-esteem, and little support structure. Each workday, she rides the train to London, a trip that takes about an hour or so.
To while the time away, she uses her very vivid imagination to create stories about a couple who lives in a house a few doors down from where she once lived when she was married to Tom. She names the couple Jess and Jason, who we later learn are Megan and Scott. She imagines that the couple is very much in love, until one morning when she sees Jess kissing another man. Even though she is a distance away, riding on the train, by the physical attributes of the man, she can tell that he isn’t Jason.
Megan Hipwell goes missing, so Rachel tells the police what she knows, except in their eyes, she has no credibility because she is often drunk, and on top of that, she stalks her ex-husband, Tom and his new wife, Anna. I know that Rachel is a woman scorned, but if a man cheats on me, dumps me to marry the woman he cheated with, why would I ever give him the satisfaction to think that he is still an important part of my life. Because of Rachel’s abuse of alcohol, he blacks out, so there are periods, when she doesn’t know what she did, or what happened to her.
Although the cops do not believe Rachel, she inserts herself into the investigation. She gets as much information as she can about what’s going on, and even contacts Scott. At one point, she goes to see the same psychologist that Megan saw, with whom she was having an affair. She visits Scott at his home to talk over things with, and this freaks Anna out, because Scott lives on Blendheim Rd, the same one that Rachel’s ex and his wife lives on. Tom is always promising Anna that he will talk to Rachel about her calling and visiting him, but he doesn't, why?
As the story unfolds, the reader realizes that Tom is not who he says he is. He tells Anna one thing, then does something different when he talks to Rachel. For instance, Toms tells Anna that he has a meeting at work, but instead he is meeting with Rachel to talk to her about her actions. And he is playing mind games with her, offering to give her money if she is short, pretending that he cares about her.
He sends her mixed messages with his passive-aggressive behavior. Tom also lies a lot, and he does it so often that he starts to believe his lies. We also see that Rachel can stay sober when she makes up her mind to do it. The police also discover Megan’s body in a shallow grave that opens up because of heavy rainfalls.
The night when Megan disappears, was a night when Rachel is drinking quite heavily, and she loses some of her memory. She tries to recreate what actually happened that night and some of her memory starts to return.
For one thing, she saw Megan going into Tom’s car, and the head wound that she has no recollection of, she remembers that Tom hit her. She starts to remember other things, so she decides to go to go to Tom’s house and tell Anna what she remembers.
Tom has done to Anna, what he did to Rachel, he was having an affair with Rachel before she disappears. It appears that Anna is willing to do anything to keep her little family intact, and has no intention of becoming a single mother. Rachel goes to talk to Anna, and while they are talking, Tom returns, and things start to get interesting.
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What will Anna do, will Rachel clean up her act and move on with her life? You will have to read The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins to find out. People describe The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins as a thriller, a page-turner, and very chilling.
The Conclusion: The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins
I recommend this book because the masses will like it, but in my humble opinion, if you are looking for a book with all those elements, then it makes sense for you to read Strangers on a Train by Patricia Highsmith.
Based on my experience, there are many great books that were written decades ago that are worth reintroducing to a younger audience. Perhaps one day, I will take that on as a project.
