The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins

Rating - 4/5
Copy - Kindle
Genre- Fiction

The plotline of the “The Girl on the train” is based on a woman who keenly observes a family from the train (when it stops at the signal) ; the plot thickens when the woman in the family the main protagonist observes,  goes missing from the suburban town on Ashbury. The plot then takes the usual off-the-mill crime-thriller book we know so well. Is she dead or has she ran away? Was she having an affair? The husband is hot-headed, so he must be the prime suspect. Throw in the missing woman’s messy past to the over-used mixture. The usual questions arise when the news breaks out & the reader wonders what’s different.  

Two things that blew my mind while I was reading the book ( in one sitting I may add!). First – the author has developed the characters so beautifully that you become invested in their journey as you see them sort themselves out. Obviously you would want to know how the story ends, but you aren’t keenly looking forward to the end of the book so that you can close the circle; instead the characters in the book take much of your mind’s space – their current conundrums, their vices & their everyday routine. The situations are described so beautifully so one can picture them. Second – the unusual narration style of the book. The book, from the start to the end, has the POV of three women who are central to the story. The POV’s switches seamlessly from one women to the other without a break or a bump to the story-telling.  It is fair to say that the most of the characters are unidimensional in the way they are portrayed. The ending is a bit of a let-down & as it goes with any thriller – you try to find some loopholes and it is disappointing to say, a loophole is present.