The voice behind a hit thriller
When Paula Hawkins’ debut psychological thriller The Girl on the Train hit shelves in January, critics were quick to tout the novel as the successor to Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl. But given the book’s phenomenal trajectory — selling more than three million copies to date, with a movie starring Emily Blunt on the way — it’s safe to say publishers are now scrambling to find the next The Girl on the Train.
Hawkins’ titular girl is Rachel, a divorced, unemployed alcoholic who finds solace in chugging back cans of gin and tonic while riding the commuter train in and out of London.
She becomes voyeuristically obsessed with a couple whose home she passes daily, romanticizing their perfect lives — until the woman goes missing and Rachel becomes embroiled in the mystery of her disappearance.
Like other female-centred stories before it, Hawkins’ novel has brought up a debate about the “likability” of its protagonist. “It’s a gendered thing. I don’t think that men are asked about likability to the same degree,” she says.
But niceness wasn’t a trait that the 43year-old London writer considered while creating Rachel, a challenging narrator even when sober. “Rachel was really interesting to write because she is incredibly frustrating and does really stupid things and has bad judgment, but I think that’s what addiction is like. Some people couldn’t stand her but I empathize with her,” says Hawkins.
Hawkins, who grew up in Zimbabwe, got her start as a financial journalist, which she says gave her discipline.
She wrote a couple of romance novels under a pseudonym, but found the genre challenging. “I think it was useful in terms of flexing my fiction muscles, and learning how to create characters and plot, but I wasn’t putting my heart and soul on the page,” she says.
“As soon as I started writing The Girl on the Train, I felt immediately better.”