A Slow Fire Burning: The addictive new Sunday Times No.1 bestseller from the author of The Girl on the Train

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Did Daniel really lure Ben to his death or was that aspect of his graphic novel just a manifestation of his guilt? In an interview with NPR, Hawkins admits that while she was walking near her London home, which is near an area of moored houseboats, she often contemplated where would be a perfect spot to hide or dispose of a body. Hawkins liked this area because both wealthy and poor are living amongst each other in an unusual setting. And we know that Hawkins loves her unstable female characters whom the reader feels frustrated and sympathy with, in equal measure.

A heartfelt memoir about race, identity and mental illness. Read by the actor himself, it makes for moving listening. This is a very cerebral mystery so I wouldn’t recommend reading this after several glasses of wine, or whatever unless you reason better this way!! You will need to think, untangle story lines and understand this myriad cast of characters and convoluted but ultimately brilliantly written novel. One highlight is that the audio version I listened to was impeccably narrated by the brilliant actress Rosumund Pike. But in summary, I enjoyed this tale but I didn’t love it. It didn’t do for me what The Girl on the Trian did. I’ll be interested to see what others think of it: I expect some will absolutely love it though others might feel as I do, that it rather passed them by. I thought the title was very apropo because of the slow burn of anger, hatred, jealousy and deceit brewing within these characters.Being uprooted and having to make a new home somewhere else had a significant impact on me; I felt an outsider for many years, in a lot of ways I think I still do. Paula Hawkins Can't say I loved it but did find the characters and their motivations interesting. Tragic and frustrating in measure. Laura is a poor young soul. She was in a horrific accident at the age of ten which left her with some brain damage, causing all kinds of unacceptable and out of control incidents to occur. She was also left with a terrible limp, all of which left her with a terrible self image. Add to this a mother who is not supportive and a father who is emotionally absent and you have one troubled young woman.

Theo Myerson and his wife Carla, who had the start of an incredible marriage, until their young son Ben died accidentally at only 3 years of age. They are both hiding enough secrets to bury any average human being. You may think you know their secrets, BUT JUST WAIT UNTIL THE ENDING!!!!!!!!!! The police tell Laura that Daniel’s blood was found on her clothes. She says she bit him. They produce the murder weapon, a knife, and Laura says that it’s not hers. Also, she tells them Miriam could have planted it, since she took Laura’s key. Who killed Daniel and why? I found it ambitious in that each character had reasons to be the murderer, depending upon the chapter. Each character endured tragedy and trauma; each has a suspicious pedigree. No one is an unreliable narrator, yet in reflecting their pasts, we wonder what the truth is. Each of us are a bit of unreliable narrators of our past, or, I should say we “color” our past to reflect what we want. What Hawkins is great at, is exposing the “shady” parts, or the “grey”. The atmosphere is dark, the small group of characters unlikable, harboring secrets and truths. The young woman Laura, a tragic past, I felt sorry for and Irene a older woman, with a big heart, the only character I actually liked. There are many misdirections which change the story in small and big ways. A book within a book which also serves to confuse. The pacing is slow, but there are constant revelations and the truths are slowly revealed. Twists and turns like a great thriller should, but it's also deep, intelligent and intensely human'

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Carla remembers her sister Angela, who confessed to being the one who left the study door open so that Ben fell. On the night Daniel died, she went to his boat and found a notebook with drawings of her, which she took.

Miriam’s kidnapper, Jeremy, is found dead in a houseboat. Spoiler Discussion for A Slow Fire Burning Theo admits to Carla that he went to see Angela. Laura admits to Irene that she stole Carla’s tote bag of jewelry. Laura gives Miriam’s manuscript to Irene. Irene reads it and thinks it sounds familiar. She realizes it reminds her of Theo’s book, which she has in the box of books Carla gave her. In the book (which belonged to Angela) she finds Daniel’s drawing of a naked Carla. Laura Kilbride – had a traumatic brain injury as a child and was with the victim the night he died. The first half of the book would have easily been rated a 2 or 3 stars, just average if not a bit overly complex. However, the last half of the book was extremely entertaining and had some twists that I was not quite expecting. At the last half of the book, it was revealed why the book was so complex.

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Overall: maybe this book may have been promoted as contemporary fiction, I could have a chance to like it more. From the beginning of the novel, I expected something big, earth shattering, surprising will happen or something so smart will come out to fool me but none of them happened. That’s why I still hear the choo choo sound of disappointment train. Pike makes deft work of these unreliable narrators who span several generations, imbuing their voices with a defensiveness and vulnerability born from past disappointments and trauma. Miriam is forever second-guessing the judgment of strangers who she knows see her as a lonely busybody, while Laura is chaotic and brittle-sounding, convinced that none of the calamities that befall her are ever her fault. In particular, Pike captures the melancholy of the widowed Irene, whose frail appearance and occasional mishaps prompt others to condescend and patronise rather than treat her as a sentient adult. This being a Hawkins novel, the plot twists are sprinkled liberally to keep listeners on their toes, though the story is sustained by the humanity of these expertly narrated characters whose secrets are slowly brought to the surface.

Laura goes to see Irene and does her shopping. When she’s passing Carla’s house, she sees the door open and steals Carla’s tote bag. Daniel himself is hard to read. We begin to learn more about him, his unhappy and caustic relationship with his mother, his aunt Carla and others, but don’t really understand him even at the end. Theo confronts Miriam. He thinks she’s been sending him letters, accusing him of stealing her manuscript, but then he realizes the letters are from Jeremy, the man who abducted Miriam and her friend Lorraine. Well, I didn't. I thought it was clever. A new way to tell a story like that, makes you think, doesn't it?"

One of the most unpredictable and saddest characters in the book is Laura. Deeply damaged mentally and physically in a car accident and left abandoned by her mother and father. Her life is complicated and scarred by a number of abusive events. She confides and cared for by Irene, another character with a tie-in and side story. Miriam catches Laura stealing some earrings and finding her own key, the one Miriam took. Miriam also gives her a copy of her manuscript. Theo has a dog, Dixon, who has gone missing. Theo is a writer. Theo and Carla’s son, Ben, was tragically killed at age three after he fell off a balcony at Angela’s house. Angela had been drinking and left Daniel, age eight, in charge. Their marriage was never the same.