The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins

image from LibraryThing

A mystery first spun in the mind of an alcoholic divorcee and then spilling into her reality.  Rachel imagines and wonders and stews and buries her loneliness and despair in a bottle.  She just can't let go of Tom, her ex, or the fantasy of the couple she glimpses through the flickering windows of her train car.  This story comes out in flicks and sputters just like those images. 

As a reader it took me a while to get into the book - the chapters alternate between voices and dates. And the story is mostly told by Rachel in various states of drunkenness - which adds to the confusion, and adds to the story, to the unreality, to the despair and regret.  

The story is also told by Anna and Megan. Anna is the current wife of Tom, Rachel's ex and Megan is the mystery woman Rachel sees from her train window.  

Very early in the book Megan disappears - completely and totally.  And Rachel decides that she may know what has happened - because she was in town the night of her disappearance.  The problem is that she can't remember anything, really, because she was black out drunk.  How do you make others believe that you know something that you can't really figure out yourself.  How do you face the demons that are there and everywhere?

Our most recent book club book.

The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick

Hugo is a scruffy french orphan caught in an impossible situation. His father was killed in a museum fire and left Hugo with an uncle who lives in the bowels of the train station and must wind and maintain all the station's clocks. He is mean and cheap and forces Hugo to steal to be able to eat. And then, he disappears.

Hugo secretly keeps the clocks running as he works on a project to amazing to really contemplate.

Before his father died he had been a clockmaker and had discovered an automaton - a man machine poised to write a secret message. The automaton was in the museum attic where he worked and that's why he was in the museum when it burned. Hugo rescued the automatan from the rubble of the museum and set out to rebuild the damaged parts. To do this - he had to steal toys from the toy maker stand at the train station. That is where he meets an old grumpy man and his god daughter.

This sets in motion a series of events that bring all the details of the mysterious machine, the old man and a history of making dreams together.

What makes this book truly spectacular is the drawings that intersperse the text. The book becomes a slow moving movie - starting with a broad shot and slowly tightening down to the main focus. There are also photographs of actual events which add a sort of newsreel feel to parts of the book. This is a big fat book that took only an hour or two to read - but it's a book that a second reading would be beneficial - it feels like there might be hidden clues and magic secrets woven into the book just waiting to be discovered.

This is an award winning book for all ages!