Kŏl on tŏ t'ŭrein

I can see why this book won last year's Goodreads Choice Award in it's category. It's an incredibly gripping, well written, unputdownable story - which took me a while to read, I'm sad to say, because I simply had to put it down often, when life got in the way.

Without giving away any spoilers, let me summarise the plot for you - because I didn't really understand what it was about either, when I first decided to read it (only that everyone around me was telling me I HAD to read it):

There's this lonely, drunk, stalkery ex-wife. She rides the train twice a day, staring wistfully at the house she used to live in. She broods about the life her ex-husband now enjoys with his new wife and daughter. Then she gets drunk and leaves him desperate voicemail messages saying how she wishes they were back together.

When she isn't doing that, she's staring at the OTHER houses on the same street, and making up stories in her head about the families that live there... and lamenting the fact that she's not living their lives. The grass is always greener on the other side, you know?

Before long, someone disappears, and our protagonist thrusts herself right in the middle. Even though she never knew the person, she decides that it's her duty to find out what happened to them.

From there, the story moves quickly, and not a screen (I read the e-book) went by that I didn't gasp inwardly at some new revelation. It definitely kept me guessing!

The main character is an incredibly complex human being. I went from pitying her, to being angry with her, to thinking she's a hero, then a nutjob, and back again. But no matter what state I was in, I always found myself identifying with her.

Again, without trying to spoil anything, I was dumbstruck when I found out what actually happened. I thought the confrontation was quite satisfying... but I DO wish that the final resolution had been a bit different. When you get there, you may decide that you agree with me. Or not; it's a personal taste thing.

The one thing that doesn't really work for me was that it's written very much like a series of diary entries... except it's in present tense. It's reminiscent of [b:Dracula|17245|Dracula|Bram Stoker|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1387151694s/17245.jpg|3165724] in that respect, with the entries alternating between several different characters' points-of-view. Sometimes the entries overlap, so you get the same encounter described from two different perspectives.

What I didn't like about it is the same thing I struggle with in any book where timelines are pivotal: I forget what the date of a particular section is by the second paragraph. Then by the time I get to the next section, with a new date (sometimes BEFORE the preceding section), its significance is completely lost on me.

I got used to that about 70% through, though.

If you enjoy a good suspenseful mystery, that at the end of the day, is like nothing you've ever read before, I highly recommend this book!