The Girl on the Train
Paula Hawkins, 2015
★ 3.96 from 3.4m ratings on Goodreads
A divorced commuter fills her days watching a perfect couple from the train, until a glimpse of something wrong pulls her into their lives. A queasy, close-up voice pulls you through blurred memory and daily train rituals, with dark humor and a growing sense that something is badly off.
Feels like unease, dread and curiosity. About memory, madness and identity.
Who it’s for
You may like it if you enjoy unreliable narrators, domestic suspense, and a story that keeps you suspicious of what the main character remembers. Be warned that the narrator can be hard to like, some stretches slow down, and the final turn has struck readers as easy to guess.
Why read it
It offers a tense, slippery look at memory and self-deception, and the divided reactions make it a good book to argue about with someone else.
A page from the book
A home you can't stop looking at, even though it hurts.
I lived at number twenty-three Blenheim Road for five years, blissfully happy and utterly wretched. I can’t look at it now. That was my first home. Not my parents’ place, not a flatshare with other students, my first home. I can’t bear to look at it. Well, I can, I do, I want to, I don’t want to, I try not to. Every day I tell myself not to look, and every day I look. I can’t help myself, even though there is nothing I want to see there, even though anything I do see will hurt me. What readers say
Readers are sharply divided: many found it gripping and fast-paced, praising the unreliable narration and alcoholism portrayal, while others were frustrated by unlikable characters, slow stretches, and a predictable reveal.
Paula Hawkins.Paula Hawkins wrote four romantic comedies under the pen name Amy Silver before The Girl on the Train became a bestseller.
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Questions readers ask
- Is The Girl on the Train for me?
- You may like it if you enjoy unreliable narrators, domestic suspense, and a story that keeps you suspicious of what the main character remembers. Be warned that the narrator can be hard to like, some stretches slow down, and the final turn has struck readers as easy to guess.
- What is The Girl on the Train like?
- A queasy, close-up voice pulls you through blurred memory and daily train rituals, with dark humor and a growing sense that something is badly off. Feels like unease, dread and curiosity. About memory, madness and identity.
- What should I read after The Girl on the Train?
- If you liked The Girl on the Train, try The Circle (Dave Eggers), American Psycho (Bret Easton Ellis) and The Couple Next Door (Shari Lapena).
A taste of the feed
The moment a quiet house becomes the wrong kind of quiet.
Anne feels her scream inside her own head and reverberating off the walls-her scream is everywhere. Then she falls silent and stands in front of the empty crib, rigid, her hand to her mouth. Marco fumbles with the light switch. They both stare at the empty crib where their baby should be. It is impossible that she not be there. There is no way Cora could have gotten out of the crib by herself. She is barely six months old.
The Couple Next Door · Shari Lapena
What it costs to answer no questions when the charge is murder.
The following day, she lay in bed in a private room at the hospital. The police questioned her in the presence of her lawyer. Alicia remained silent throughout the interview. Her lips were pale, bloodless; they fluttered occasionally but formed no words, made no sounds. She answered no questions. She could not, would not, speak. Nor did she speak when charged with Gabriel’s murder. She remained silent when she was placed under arrest, refusing to deny her guilt or confess it.
The Silent Patient · Alex Michaelides
The private prayer of anyone who has ever watched a perfect clique from outside.
I quietly prayed for the hug implosion all year last year. That their ardent squeezing might cause the flesh to ooze from the sleeves, neckholes, and A‑line hems of their cupcake dresses like so much inane frosting. That they would get tangled in each other’s Game of Thrones hair, choked by the ornate braids they were forever braiding into each other’s heart‑shaped lit‑ tle heads. That they would choke on each other’s blandly grassy perfume. Never happened. Not once.
Bunny · Mona Awad
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