The Blue Hour: A GMA Book Club Pick

I'm maybe in the minority for not loving The Girl on the Train. I thought it was okay, better than the unrelenting flood of "GRIPPING PSYCHOLOGICAL THRILLER" that has come our way since, well Girl on the Train, plus "Gone Girl", "Woman in the Window"...etc. I was surprised when I started out LOVING this one.The beginning of "The Blue Hour" is SO promising. A famous, and dead, female artist's sculpture may, shockingly, contain, not a deer bone, but a human one. Can this be tied to her long-vanished ex-husband? There's a great and sympathetic male character in Becker, basically her curator. There's lots of art talk. There's a mystery in why she left her estate to her nemesis. There's even a desolate and windswept island where she created much of her work. The writing begins in a luminous and lyrical way - a really good read for several chapters. This is fun!Unfortunately, and this is all too common in this genre, apparently whilst men are generally either predators or a bit milquetoast, the complicated women who are set up as main characters are ... not good people. They are unstable, needy, delusional, often unattractive (apparently a cardinal sin in Hawkins's universe), but if attractive they are mean and manipulative - it's like a catalogue of misogyny, and it's not worthy of any author, let alone a woman.I really disliked the last third and particularly the ending of this book. It's pretty predictable in terms of whodunit, and also very dark and depressing. If you have no need of a happy ending, and don't mind being inside the head of extremely disturbed people, perhaps you'll feel different. I would give the first half of the book 4-5 stars and the last half 1 star (kinda wild I know), and, in general, I think your time is better spent on - depending what you're seeking - a total beach romp (take your pick) or something wrenching AND meaningful, like "Old God's Time".

Wow…this was one of the best books I’ve read in a very long time. It started slow for me and I was worried I was reading an article critic book. Then, couldn’t put it down. This was a great book.

I really enjoyed it all along, but wanted a little more positive ending. There were too many unexplained missing people and deaths for there not to have been a serious investigation.

My friend loved it. Couldn’t put it down!

So well written, so well plotted, so many threads running through these lives and then they all build to a startling unexpected crescendo. Gobbled this one up like eating potato chips… Could not stop could not put it down!