The Girl on the Train (novel)
.png) US hardcover art | |
| Author | Paula Hawkins |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Published | 13 January 2015 (Riverhead Books, US) 15 January 2015 (Doubleday, UK) |
| Publication place | United Kingdom, United States, |
| Media type | Print (Hardback) |
| Pages | 336 (US) 320 (UK) |
| ISBN | 978-1-59463-366-9 |
The Girl on the Train (2015) is a psychological thriller novel by British author Paula Hawkins.[1] The novel debuted at No. 1 on The New York Times Fiction Best Sellers of 2015 list (combined print and e-book) dated February 1, 2015,[2] and remained in the top position for 13 consecutive weeks, until April 2015.[3] In January 2016 it became the No.1 bestseller again for two weeks. Many reviews referred to the book as "the next Gone Girl", a popular 2012 novel.[4][5]
By early March 2015, the novel had sold over 1 million copies,[6] and 1.5 million by April.[7] It has occupied the number one spot of the UK hardback book chart for 20 weeks, the longest any book has ever held the top spot.[8] By early August 2015, the book had sold more than 3 million copies in the US alone, and, by August 2016, an estimated 11 million copies worldwide.[9]
The film rights were acquired by DreamWorks Pictures in 2014 for Marc Platt Productions.[10] The adaptation, starring Emily Blunt and directed by Tate Taylor, is scheduled for release on 10 October 2016.
Plot
The story is a first-person narrative told from the point of view of three women: Rachel, Anna and Megan. Rachel Watson is a 32-year-old alcoholic reeling from the dissolution of her marriage to Tom, who left her for another woman. Rachel's drinking has caused her to lose her job; she frequently binges and has blackouts. Very frequently, while drunk, she harasses Tom by phone and sometimes even in person, though she has little or no memory of these acts once she sobers up. Tom is now married to, and has a daughter with, his former mistress Anna – a situation that fuels Rachel's self-destructive tendencies, as it was her inability to conceive a child that began her spiral into alcoholism. Concealing her unemployment from her flatmate, Rachel follows her old routine of taking the train to London every day, with her train route taking her past her old house, which is now occupied by her husband, the woman with whom he cheated on Rachel, and their baby. She also begins compulsively watching an attractive couple who lives a few houses away from Tom, fantasizing about their perfect life together. Rachel has never met them and has no idea that their life is far from perfect, and that the woman, Megan Hipwell, helps Anna care for her child. Megan outwardly seems perfect to Rachel—beautiful, happy, and married to a handsome, devoted man. However, she has a troubled past that she conceals from everyone who knows her, and this gives her severe insomnia. She escapes from her troubles by taking a series of lovers, while she secretly finds her life to be boring and shallow. She has sought help coping with her problems by seeing a therapist, Dr. Kamal Abdic, whom she would like to seduce. Eventually, she reveals to him a dark secret she has never confided to anyone before.
Anna Watson is a young, beautiful woman who is very much in love with her husband Tom Watson, Rachel's ex-husband. Anna is deliriously happy as a stay-at-home mother to their young daughter Evie. While at first she enjoyed the idea of parading her conquest of Tom in front of Rachel as a way to show that he picked her over Rachel, she eventually becomes furious at Rachel's harassment of her and her family and wants to move from Rachel's former house and report Rachel's stalking to the police. She particularly dreads Rachel's presence because one day, Rachel entered their home, picked up their baby, and walked outside with her. She views Rachel as a threat to her family and home.
One day, Rachel is stunned to see Megan kissing a man other than her husband. The next day, after a night of heavy drinking, Rachel awakens to find herself bloody and injured, with no memories of the night before, but certain that she has done something she will regret. Soon, she learns that one of the top stories of the day is that Megan is missing. Rachel is questioned by the police after Anna reports having seen her staggering around drunk in the area the night of Megan's disappearance. Rachel starts to become inappropriately interested in the missing persons case. She contacts the police to tell them she thinks Megan was having an affair because she was obsessively watching her every morning and evening from the train, and then contacts Megan's husband, Scott. She lies and tells Scott that they were friends, and also tells him her thoughts about the affair. Rachel learns that the man she saw kissing Megan the day she disappeared was Dr. Abdic.
Rachel contacts Dr. Abdic, lying about her true identity and background as part of a ruse to get close to him and learn more about him. She makes a therapy appointment with him, ostensibly to see if he can help her to recall the events that happened during her blackout the night of the disappearance. While Dr. Abdic suspects nothing, Rachel begins to gain insights into her life by speaking with him, inadvertently benefiting from her therapy. Her connections to Scott and Kamal, though built on lies, make her feel more important. She ends up not drinking for several days at a time, but always relapses. Meanwhile, she continues to call, visit, and harass her ex-husband and his new family. Then Megan's body is found and she is revealed to have been pregnant, and that the unborn child was fathered by neither Scott nor Abdic. As Scott discovers Rachel's lies and lashes out at her, her memories of the night of the incident become clearer. Rachel remembers seeing Megan get into Tom's car. At the same time, Anna discovers that Tom and Megan were having an affair. These associations enable Rachel to trust her own memories more and she realizes that many of the crazy things Tom told her she did while drunk, but that she doesn't remember doing, were not actually done by her. He has been gaslighting her for years, which has affected her belief in herself and made her question her sanity. Armed with her sad realization, and that he must have been the one to kill Megan, Rachel warns Anna. When Anna confronts him, Tom confesses to murdering Megan after she threatened to ruin his life by revealing that he impregnated her. Anna is cowed in fear of her daughter's safety and, though Tom tries to beat and intimidate Rachel into keeping silent, she defies him and fights back. Knowing he is about to kill her, Rachel stabs Tom in the neck with a corkscrew. Anna helps Rachel make sure that he dies from the wound. When the police arrive, former adversaries Rachel and Anna coordinate their stories to support their actions having been in self-defence.
Reception
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The book won the 2015 Goodreads Choice Award in the category Mystery & Thriller.[11]
Translations
The foreign rights have been sold in 34 countries and the book has been translated into many languages, including:
| Language | Publisher | Book name | Translator |
|---|---|---|---|
| French[12] | Sonatine Éditions | La Fille du train | Corinne Daniellot |
| German[citation needed] | Random House | Girl on the Train | Christoph Göhler |
| Bahasa Indonesia[citation needed] | Noura Books Publishing | The Girl on The Train | Inggrid Nimpoeno |
| Italian[13] | Piemme | La ragazza del treno | B. Porteri |
| Polish[citation needed] | Świat Książki | Dziewczyna z pociągu | Jan Kraśko |
| Portuguese[citation needed] | Topseller | A Rapariga no Comboio | José João Letria (revised by Diogo Montenegro) |
| Spanish[citation needed] | Editorial Planeta | La Chica del Tren | Aleix Montoto |
| Turkish[citation needed] | İthaki Publishing-house | Trendeki Kız | Aslıhan Kuzucan |
| Traditional Chinese[citation needed] | Eurasian Publishing Group and Sole Press | 列車上的女孩 | Wang Xinxin |
| Vietnamese[citation needed] | Nhã Nam | Cô gái trên tàu | Huyền Vũ |
| Romanian[citation needed] | Editura Trei | Fata din tren | Ionela Chirila |
| Bengali[citation needed] | Batighar Prokashoni | The Girl on The Train | Kishor Pasha Imon |
| Hebrew[citation needed] | Keter-Books | הבחורה על הרכבת | Hadasa Handler |
| Slovene[14] | Mladinska knjiga Založba | Dekle na vlaku | Alenka Ropret |
Film adaptation
The film rights for the novel were acquired in March 2014 by DreamWorks Pictures and Marc Platt Productions, with Jared Leboff (a producer at Marc Platt) set to produce. [15]Tate Taylor, the director of The Help, was announced as the director of the film in May 2015, with the script written by Erin Cressida Wilson.[16] In June 2015, British actress Emily Blunt was in talks to play the role of Rachel.[17] Author Hawkins said in July 2015 that the setting of the film would be moved from the UK to the US.[18] The film began production in the New York City area in October 2015.[19] It is scheduled for release on 7 October 2016.[20]
References
- ^ Maslin, Janet (4 January 2015). "Another Girl Gone in a Tale of Betrayal - The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins". The New York Times. Retrieved 1 July 2016.
- ^ "Best Sellers: Combined Print & E-Book Fiction". The New York Times. 1 February 2015. Retrieved 1 July 2016.
- ^ "Best Sellers : Hardcover Fiction". The New York Times. 26 April 2015. Retrieved 1 July 2016.
- ^ Review excerpts, paulahawkinsbooks.com, Retrieved 21 April 2015
- ^ Lawless, Jill (22 March 2015). 'The Girl on the Train' is a runaway hit for Paula Hawkins, Redding Record Searchlight (Associated Press story)
- ^ McClurg, Jocelyn (11 March 2015). 'Girl on the Train' sells 1 million copies, USA Today
- ^ O'Connor William (20 April 2015). The Fastest-Selling Adult Novel in History: Paula Hawkins’ ‘The Girl On The Train’, The Daily Beast
- ^ Alison Flood, The Girl on the Train breaks all-time book sales record, The Guardian, 8 July 2015.
- ^ BBC News (4 August 2016) The Girl On The Train author Paula Hawkins joins world's top earning authors '... with global book sales of 11 million...'
- ^ Kroll, Justin (24 March 2014). "DreamWorks Acquires Novel The Girl on the Train for Marc Platt". Variety. Retrieved 29 June 2016.
- ^ "The 2015 Goodreads Choice Awards". goodreads.com.
- ^ http://www.sonatine-editions.fr/livres/La-Fille-du-train.asp
- ^ Edizioni Piemme. "La ragazza del treno". Edizioni Piemme.
- ^ "Dekle na vlaku". Mladinska knjiga (in Slovenian). Retrieved 2016-09-18.
- ^ http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/02/movies/the-girl-on-the-train-book-movie-adaptation.html?_r=0
- ^ McNary, Dave (21 May 2015). "The Help Director Tate Taylor Boards Girl on the Train". Variety. Retrieved 6 June 2015.
- ^ Kroll, Justin. "Emily Blunt in Talks to Star in The Girl on the Train Adaptation". Variety. Retrieved 6 June 2015.
- ^ Andrew Pulver, The Girl on the Train film to be set in US not UK, The Guardian, 13 July 2015.
- ^ "Casting Featured Male Role in DreamWorks Pictures The Girl On The Train Starring Emily Blunt & Chris Evans". Retrieved 6 December 2015.
- ^ McNary, Dave (6 December 2015). "Universal Boards Emily Blunt's Girl on the Train". Variety. Retrieved 23 December 2015.