Improvement

My second blind date with a book went much better than my first; I read all of Paula Hawkins' novel The Girl on the Train in one day.

What I liked about this blind date: the writing, which was spare, elegant and cleverly executed; the pace of the story, which slowly snowballed, the three points of view presented with dates, which helped me keep the convoluted timeline straight, and the mystery itself, which aside from one barely noticeable reveal was quite deft.

What I didn't like about this blind date: unreliable narrators, alcoholics and endless self-pity parties don't resonate with me personally. I guessed who the killer was going to be almost from the beginning because of that reveal (but no spoilers here.) Most of the characters seemed artificially flawed to excess. The time-skip references to sex (where a writer presents a sex scene but leap-frogs over any description of the act to present the aftermath) in the story were virtually identical, probably inadvertant, but after the fourth time of reading the same bit it did make me wince. If you don't want to write about sex, skip it altogether and focus on something else.

It's a cleverly-done story, and I see why they made it into a movie (although I am not tempted to watch the film version.) Emotionally I felt distanced, as there were no characters I could connect with, but that prompted me to focus on the architecture of the puzzle. Most readers would likely enjoy the mystery, and perhaps the chance to get inside the minds of the three POV characters. I didn't feel as if I'd wasted the reading time, so I'll recommend it with a note of caution on all the negative points I mentioned -- if these are major triggers for you, give this one a pass.