This book was wild and honestly unlike anything I’ve read before! From the first page, we already know that one of the five people waiting on a train platform in London will die. It is 7:01am and the death will occur within the next few minutes, when the next train is scheduled to arrive. The main question is, which of the five will it be (and secondarily, will it be an accident or deliberate)? The premise sounds simple and to be honest, when I first started reading, I was wondering how the story was going to play out – I mean, given that everything is supposed to happen within a few minute timespan, how could the story possibly last the entire 240 pages? I was definitely intrigued and drawn in by the seemingly simple setup at the start of the story where we are introduced to each of the main characters in a way that breaks the fourth wall, with the reader not only being addressed directly, but also given instructions to pay attention to certain things. And it turned out that I didn’t have to wait long to find out how the author, Ilona Bannister, manages to turn a five-minute premise into a 240-page story, as, interspersed throughout the train station scene, we are given each of the five character’s backstories. But even here, the execution of the story is not as simple as it may seem, for we learn things about each character during these intervening chapters that will end up having an impact on how we view the train station scene. Specifically, we won’t be able to help formulating opinions about each of the characters based on what we read about them, and ultimately, this influences our judgement of the story’s outcome – basically, who dies and the deeper moral question of whether they deserve it -- which of course, is not revealed until the last few pages.
This is one of the most interesting, engaging, and uniquely original stories I’ve read in a long time. As a reader, I definitely felt that I had a vested interest in the story from start to finish, despite the fact that I was able to guess “the death” early on. With this book, the thrill is actually in the process of getting to the outcome – that is, learning about each character, their vices, their desperation, and, most importantly, the circumstances that brought them to this moment at the train station – and then using everything we learned to justify (or not) the death at the end of the story. So essentially, this story is a study of the base impulses and instincts that make up human nature, with the reader, then, basically forced to be judge and jury. This is, no doubt, a clever setup and if I were to look at this book from a writing / craft perspective (i.e.: the brilliant way the story was executed), it probably deserves a 5. However, I’m the type of reviewer who puts more emphasis on reading experience and how a book or story made me feel -- in this regard, well, I found all of the characters reprehensible and, as such, couldn’t bring myself to like any of them (which, now that I think about it, was probably the author’s point in structuring the story the way she did). Given my frustration with the characters, which did impact my reading experience, but yet still recognizing the brilliance of the story, I figured a 4 was the fairest way to go.
Overall, this was a compelling and fascinating read that I definitely recommend, especially if you are into slow-burn, character-driven psychological thrillers. Speaking of which, for me, this was one of the “truest” psychological dramas I’ve read in a long time, in the sense that I actually felt challenged psychologically as a reader, to stop and think and assess, then to doubt and re-assess (and repeat this process, sometimes to no avail). This one definitely requires that you put in the work (both mentally and psychologically), so I would say keep that in mind if you do decide to pick this up.
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