I love Christina Baker Kline's Orphan Train, and I wanted to love this too. But I didn't. It begins with the protagonist, Hayley, running in fear. We don't know who's chasing her but she's afraid for her life. This short chapter is dated Dec. 2023. Next, it's 2 months earlier, and we learn about Hayley's parents being killed in a fire. And Hayley's sister Jenna is a suspect, but then Jenna is cleared, and then she dies. We don't learn exactly how Jenna dies, but she was a drug addict so...we assume. Hayley meets Brandon Stone at the gathering for her sister's funeral in Florida (where Hayley grew up). Brandon is a contractor. He's also a quiet guy. Soon enough, we learn that Brandon is more than a bit anti-social. Even rude. The two of them marry rather quickly. Hayley has inherited a lot from her dead parents (her dad was in banking). The headlines call her an "heiress." Brandon also comes into an inheritance when his dad dies (though it appears they were estranged)-- he inherits his childhood home in the woods of the Adirondacks. Brandon had moved from Florida to NYC upon their marriage, but mere months later, he wants to leave behind NYC and move to his childhood home in the woods. This fits with his character (what little we know of it), because he previously lived off the grid in the swamps of Florida, fishing to eat.
Haley has trust issues. She was betrayed by Melinda (who was either a friend from college or a "cubicle mate at Domicile"). Melinda "sells" Hayley's story to some news site - that Haley's sister was an addict. Yet Haley marries a guy rather quickly. A guy who makes her laugh, but is an asshole -- whose assholeness stretches back to childhood on the playground, as we hear from one of Brandon's schoolmates from childhood.
I did not finish this book. I stopped at page 43 because I find too many things unbelievable, and confusing, and I don't like the characters. Like, how stupid is Hayley to marry a man so quickly, when she is an "heiress?" What does she love about him that enables her to overlook his overt rudeness to other people? And why did Hayley give up her life in NYC to move to a rural town in upper NY, with a husband she hardly knows? To a secluded house atop a mountain, a place where she barely sleeps because she does NOT enjoy the setting among nature? Eg, she's afraid of coyotes, and she dislikes so much silence. Then why did she agree to move there?? (Note that Brandon is known by his past schoolmate from childhood, in this rural NY town, as the Coyote Kid...hmmm.)
Worst of all is this example of bad writing: "Only Emily and Melinda, Hayley's cubicle mate at Domicile and the one friend she'd let into her life since the fire, could coax her out for the occasional coffee or cocktail." --- this sentence gives us two names. Is one the cubicle mate and the other is "the one friend she'd let in"?? If so, which is which? Or did the writer accidentally include two names where there should be one?? Because it's Emily that Hayley seems to trust, while Melinda betrayed her. As the reader, I don't want bad writing. So I'm stopping at page 43. Reading other online reviews, it appears that this book is first in a two-part series. Nope. Not for me. I cannot recommend.
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