4 Reasons You Must Read The Girl on the Train
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Have you read The Girl on the Train yet? If not, you're missing out on this year's hottest book, and if you have, ohmygod look who's going to be in the cast! The book has us in the same kind of tizzy we experienced back when Gone Girl, the book, came out, and the 2015 novel has been drawing comparisons to the 2012 book from the get-go. Here's why — and here is also everything we know about the adaptation.
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It's a Mystery With a Juicy Twist
The 2012 novel Gone Girl was the book that every one of your friends was reading, and as you all passed it around to each other, you had to caution people: don't spoil the twist! That's why we were all talking about it: it was a crazy mystery with elements of murder and domestic unrest. The Girl on the Train also has both, without having a story that hews too close to Gone Girl. It's that book that, while you're reading it, you can't help but ask everyone you know if they've read it, then conspiratorially discuss it when they say yes — and demand they read it now if they say no.
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It Has a Female Protagonist You Won't Be Sure If You Relate To
Amy is Gone Girl's villain, but she's not 100 percent unrelatable. Flynn gives her a couple memorable diatribes about "Cool Girls," and her motivation stems from an all-too-common marital betrayal: infidelity. That's part of the reason many readers felt conflicted about sympathizing with her: she had her reasons. The Girl on the Train's protagonist is Rachel, and though she's a totally different personality type than Amy, she has some big flaws. You won't initially see yourself in Rachel, but as the book unfolds, there will be times you'll totally get her.
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The Author Is a Rising Female Author You Need to Know About
Gone Girl made Gillian Flynn a bestselling author who now has two movies adapted from her works, and The Girl on the Train's Paula Hawkins looks poised to follow in her footsteps. This is the first fictional novel from the British author, who was named writer of the year at this year's Glamour Women of the Year awards.
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It's Becoming a Highly-Anticipated Movie
Of course, the biggest parallel between the two books is that The Girl on the Train is being adapted for big screen. Gone Girl, of course, was critically acclaimed and even netted an Oscar nomination for Rosamund Pike, and showed us a side of Ben Affleck we'd never seen before. The Girl on the Train looks like it will be the next hot adaptation we can scrutinize — it already has a star-studded cast, including Emily Blunt and Justin Theroux, that we're loving.