For Christmas, I received the Paula Hawkins book 'The Girl on the Train'. Having recently finished it, I thought I'd give you a review and let you know my honest opinion on it.
Generally, the feedback around this book is incredible, everybody is raving about it! So, maybe it's just me? While I cannot deny that Paula Hawkins is an incredibly talented author with a beautiful writing style, something about the Girl on the Train fell a little flat for me. I'll try and explain the best way can without giving away any spoilers.
Hawkins writes the book from the viewpoint of three different characters, each chapter alternating between these characters. By doing this, we learn so much about so many characters and really build up and bond with them, so props to her for doing that. It's just a shame that these characters, and their stories, become sort of irrelevant by the end. The book is certainly packed full of twist, which normally has me hooked on a book, but for some reason I often struggled to find the motivation to pick the book up, I think to me the pace became a little slow in the middle and I became so fed up of not knowing what was going on and "filler storytelling" (those bits of the book that add nothing, they're just there). Some people really love the fact that the story is dragged out and keeps you questioning and in suspense for so long, but this just wasn't for me. Furthermore, for it to be dragged out that long and for the ending to be what it was? Not a fan. I haven't yet seen the movie and I normally always prefer books to movies, but in this case i actually think the book would work better as a movie. The "filler" storytelling wouldn't occupy as much time and you'd get to the end of the movie not feeling pissed off that you'd spent a week and half reading it. With the movie, its only an hour and a half of your time gone, no biggy.
I am fully aware that I am in the minority, so it is probably just down to my personal taste, since everyone I know LOVES this book. The high reviews around it are a testament to Paula Hawkins, but this one just wasn't for me - sorry !
Always Read,
Laura xoxo