My edition: Paperback owned
Pages: 395
Stand alone
Genre: Thriller, Mystery
Published: Jan 13, 2015
Rating:
Synopsis:
Rachel catches the same commuter train every morning. She knows it will wait at the same signal each time, overlooking a row of back gardens. She’s even started to feel like she knows the people who live in one of the houses. “Jess and Jason,” she calls them. Their life—as she sees it—is perfect. If only Rachel could be that happy. And then she sees something shocking. It’s only a minute until the train moves on, but it’s enough. Now everything’s changed. Now Rachel has a chance to become a part of the lives she’s only watched from afar. Now they’ll see; she’s much more than just the girl on the train…
Review:
To be truthful with you, I was quite scared to pick this one up. I can’t even remember how this book came into my possession. It is a hyped-up book and with hyped-up books there comes expectations though one tries to keep an open mind. I remember reading some reviews on this but it has been so long ago. I also remember starting the movie but I didn’t finish it. I think I stopped it due to wanting to read the book first.
Fair warning: Spoilers
Life is not a paragraph, and death is no parenthesis.
At first, I could not tell you exactly what was going on but the writing was good enough for me to continue. There are multiple POVs. The first is Rachel who is an alcoholic and it starts in the year 2013. The next is Megan who is the “Jess” to Rachel and it starts in 2012. The third is Anna who also starts in 2013.
Characters:
Rachel- Yall I do feel bad for her. She deals with not being able to get pregnant by drinking her sorrows away. Her husband instead of being supportive and trying to get her help or even understand her side cheats on her. (If you continue reading I explain what I think of him.)
Megan- She is complicated. I hate that she cheated on her husband with her therapist (with who I have a whole list of problems). The backstory we get on her does make me feel bad for her and also not like her even more at the same time.
Tom- I do not like Tom. I can understand to a point of not feeling like in your marriage that you are enough for your wife. BUT that DOES NOT give you the right to cheat!! Especially when your wife is going through something. So Rachel became an alcoholic due to her not being able to have children. She fell hard into a depression. Instead of trying to work it out, get help or something this dude cheats on her, divorces her, moves in the new wife who is able to have children. I mean how crappy of a guy. Also if you don’t want your ex stalking you or bothering you, why don’t you move and change your cell numbers. Tom is a coward. Plain and simple.
Scott- This guy confused me. I’m not quite sure how I feel about him.
Anna- I was going to give Anna the benefit of the doubt like maybe she didn’t know Tom was married, but then I came to her first point of view and I instantly hated her. Here is a quote from Anna.- “Everyone told me I was insane to agree to move in to Tom’s house. But then everyone thought I was insane to get involved with a married man, let alone a married man whose wife was highly unstable, and I’ve proved them wrong on that one.” No, Anna what you proved was that you are a horrible human being. There is even pride in what she did. She doesn’t care that she helped an already spiraling woman go off the deep end. She has no right to play victim especially when she knew the mindset that Rachel was in.
On all the characters I have no idea (except Tom and Anna) how to fully feel about them. They are all horrible in their own way. There was not one character I rooted for or even would care how they ended up. I just wanted to know what the heck was going on.
By the way, the little bit of the movie I did see seemed to focus too much on the sex and not on gripping us with the mystery. So I highly doubt I’ll waste my time watching the movie.
The Kansan Reader 