The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins

Lam Vu

On Reading

        Have you ever read any book that you feel like you do not get the point of the book or even what are they saying? If yes, have you ever wondered why? I remember the first time I read a book. I could not understand what were they trying to convey through the story. I was confused and bored. But then, one day, I found my favorite book and it had opened a whole new world to me. The language that they used was easy to understand and all the details were described subtly and realistically. I felt like as if I could get on the character’s boat of adventure. Ever since that time, I realized that language is the golden key to connect the readers with the characters’ world.

        First, if you are reading a book in a language that you are not fluent in, it would bring you boredom and confusion. Since I came to Canada for school, I have to read at least one book for every summer. As I really like thriller movies, therefore, last summer I picked a thriller book, “The Girl On The Train" by Paula Hawkins. Honestly, it was not a bad book. The plot was good and has a lot of surprising twists. However, the fact that it is not written in my first language gave me a lot of struggles reading and understanding the meaning of the book. There are a lot of narrators who take turns to tell the story, also the relationship among the characters was not explained at first which brought me the distraction. In addition, there were plenty of words that I could not figure out what does it mean in this context. For these reasons, I did not really like my summer reading book.

        Flipping back to the first book that I have read. The book was written in my first language and does not have a bad plot, too. Nevertheless, the language and phraseology that the author used just did not make sense which led the theme of the book to be vague to me. Furthermore, the author used awful terms to express the character's emotion and put all details of the book illogically. The book made me feel bored and brought me no interest to finish the book. It was a bad experience on reading.

        After the first experience of reading, I used to be disappointed and had no interest in books. But then one day my sister recommended me a book that she loved, after the first few pages, I fell in love with it. The book was easy to understand, the meaning was clear and most importantly, the terms that are used in the book can convey the mood of the characters subtly and emotionally. From then on, I acknowledge that language is really essential in every book.

        My experience has clearly shown that the language plays a really important part in the book, it is one of the golden keys that connect the readers’ souls with the character. It can determine the art, humanity or even success of the book. However, this does not mean that if you can not understand the language then the book is bad. The meaning behind the book is still one of the main factors of a book. The reading world is way larger than you thought, hence, be smart and choose the book that not only brings you fun and interest but also draws deep and meaningful message.