The Girl On The Train

 

It starts off like a whisper of sounds telling the reader, or rather reminding the reader to be careful of Rachel. The delusional and alcoholic character stays as a rotten flower who has been caught up in a labyrinth of her own. Cheated by her husband, caught in a web of lies, unable to conceive, divorced by her husband, being a terminated employee, her ex-husband, new wife and their child in their same house were a long list of what she had lost through the last two years. These plethora of reasons made her stomach turn and her fingers itch when alcohol was denied. But some things of her routine didn’t change due to her best friend who was concerned about her. Travelling like she used to, walking around the streets, her routine goes off like any other work day, when she had a job. Her only relief was the train which carried her back and forth, showing the greenery and scenery. Peeping into a happy person’s life would be a great job if one didn’t have and with a sadistic life like hers, it was the best. Hands wrapped around, the kiss and the love were the attributes she saw when she named an imaginary couple across the rails. She tries so hard to get out of her alcoholic life but as people as ‘once done, forever induced’ also applies to her. But one day, she was forced to or rather she told herself to quit when the epitome of what a feminine character should be betrayed her eyes. Stepping forth, she decides to move forward only to find herself on the same trodden path. Leaving mysteries and suspense behind the presumed ideal woman’s death, her path lights as she remembers that she was somewhere along the same lane as hers. However, her illusioned brain doesn’t work even when hypnosis paves the way. Trying to collect her past of that Black Friday, she tumbles into more secrets of the woman she once idealized through the small window of a long train. The ideal woman had gone and next, when her lies to resolve the puzzle pieces were caught, she found herself against the not-so-ideal husband’s wall with his fingers wrapped around her neck! The paradigm of an ideal couple was lost and the beast in the men whom she depended or rather who made her dependent came to light. Her dependency and sympathetic life were what they took care of and what she missed when she was supposed to clean herself up! Dusted and done, it all ended in revealing a larger portion of life which she never pretended to see.

 

Written by Paula Hawkins, this book indeed sticks a note on the exploitations, love, betrayal, hatred and what alcoholism can do to one. It might not have been the first but the rumours which spread across the walls reiterate what this book is titled. A Train and the mishap behind the picturesque of what life looked like for an outsider sitting inside a train!