Trains and Lovers: A Novel

This book is quite different from the previous McCall Smith books I've read (Lady's detective agency, Scotland Street, Isabelle Dalhousie). It was sensitive and quite interesting, and well worth the read - very enjoyable.

I would find it difficult not to give this author a 5 star rating. He portrays 4 real personalities in situations we can all identify with. Tricky moral issues are presented in a story that flows beautifully around 4 travellers who reveal their particular life & love experiences. No dog in this story but I can live with that.

I love the Botswana series, so bought this based on the author. Four stories are told, but don't seem related and didn't resolve. As soon as one story becomes interesting, it is dropped and another begins. I kept hoping it would get better, but it didn't.

I love the Botswana series, so bought this based on the author. Four stories are told, but don't seem related and didn't resolve. As soon as one story becomes interesting, it is dropped and another begins. I kept hoping it would get better, but it didn't.

I adore this author, my favourites being Scotland Street and Mma Ramotswe. I am the first to buy the next book in each of these series and devour them. But I never really got into the Isabel Dalhousie series or Corduroy Mansions as I felt McCall Smith was trying to extend too far and so these became a bit wishy washy and were not so enjoyable. Trains and Lovers is similar to Corduroy Mansions, but they are on a train instead. Each of the 4 main characters who are strangers sharing a booth on a train, shares their story with one another as they journey across the land. Whilst there are the lovely McCall Smith life reflections and indeed life lessons he is reknown for (especially in Mma Ramotswe) books, I found myself skim reading and thinking ' all a bit same old'. I finished it, with respect for the author, but unfortunately only 3 stars - its ok.

The statement at the beginning about strangers sharing words during a train trip is supposed to be the reason for these short stories all appearing in one book. The stories do not connect, the people on the train do not connect, each one just sort of ends.

Probably the most attention grabbing story is about "Jenny", or is she Jenny? Do we really ever know someone else is the theme. This story would have worked as an Agatha Christie, but not in the day of internet.

Every single thing that calms Hugh down about Jenny, comes out of Jenny's mouth. The phone number of her "cousin" is provided by Jenny. Why on earth was he not looking online, following up any and all leads about this girl, and her ex-boyfriend? He took no initiative to verify anything. Surely she had relatives, friends, co-workers etc. There are yearbooks from so many places online. If they are not online, they exist in libraries in home towns. A simple email to ask for copies of Jenny, and her cousin would be a start.

Wouldn't anyone's FIRST inclination be to google that name on the passport?

This is an author who enjoys the idea of philosophy and his characters often have their minds heading off into long dialogs of thought. Having to wade through or by pass these distractions, gets old. He is also extremely pleased to show off his character's knowledge of poetry and quotations. This need to show himself to be well read and properly educated through his characters is not endearing.

This is not really a book in terms of having start, middle, finish, or plot. It is at best, a short collection of short stories that have no bearing on each other.

I found this book, by one of my favorite authors, to be a solid 5-star in so many ways! This was quite a lovely surprise initially, as I don't care for the Isabella or Scotland Street series, and didn't have high hopes for this book, but I'm a sucker for train stories. As I began reading, I was pleasantly surprised. The four lives that we are so gently allowed to be a part of are a blessed departure from what we, as readers, are accustomed to these days, I.e., kidnapping, brutality or in-your-face meanness. None of that with AMS! Even I could imagine this train journey, the people chatting and having good conversations. But AMS constantly leaves his characters almost in mid-sentence, and a new conversation is begun, by another character, without a clue as to what we're supposed to do with the other one! Is his story over? Are we going to find out what happens with Andrew or is he toast? A couple of times I found myself flipping ahead to see how, for example, Kay's story played out before I got all involved in Hugh's. But overall it was worth the skipping and flipping and I loved it!

Trains and Lovers is a lightweight novel that can be read in an afternoon, easily. It strings together four unrelated short stories as told by four individuals who meet while seated together on a train and decide to tell each other some very personal things.

Each of the four stories involves love and lovers in different situations, with varying challenges and results. If you can believe that four total strangers would tell each other these very intimate stories, complete with dialogue, during a train ride, then you'll probably enjoy this novel without prejudice.

The stories themselves are not terribly compelling, but I still wanted to know what happened in each one, once the foundations were laid. The stories were simplistic, sweet, idealistic, and had no profound messages to impart, but unlike the author's unoriginal method of lumping disparate tales together to make a novel, at least the individual story lines were fresh.

The one thing about this author's style that struck me more than anything was his way of making this novel read as though it were written 60 years ago, in spite of the fact that there were mentions of computers and mobile phones. Even though the characters in the stories and those telling them are supposed to be modern day and young, the stilted style made me think of novels from the 1950s or 60s. I found that element to be very intriguing.

TRAINS AND LOVERS is a gentle and absorbing read from Alexander McCall Smith, known for his many series of books including the Isabel Dahlhousie, 44 Scotland Street, Portuguese Irregular Verbs, and No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Series. In T and L he wanders from the aggregate to the singular motif and I’m glad he did.

The theme of travelers thrown together and passing the time by exchanging stories is not new. In this case we have strangers on a train traveling from Edinburgh to London sharing train stories. Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales is strikingly similar in that a number of pilgrims, traveling from Southwick to Canterbury, agree to entertain each other with stories. A meal is the prize for the best tale at the end of the journey. Smith does not offer up a prize for the stories in T and L but I found them to be more readable and beguiling than those of Chaucer. They certainly are shorter and, in my opinion, more worthy of a good meal.

It should probably be noted, as many reviewers have, that train passengers would most likely not be so free with the details of their lives. If you have ridden on a train you’ll probably recall the reluctance of most passengers to even turn their heads towards their fellow passengers much less share an intimate moment from their life.

But here we have a Scotsman telling of a romance with a co-worker that blossomed over a famous painting he believed to be a fake. An Australian woman recounts her life at a remote train siding in the Outback. A middle-aged man confesses to a crush he had for another man that lasted many years, and a young Englishman describes how he met a mysterious woman by accident when he got off at the wrong train station. The listeners are interested, they ask for more detail, they encourage each other to continue if details drag, and appear to be motivated to get their own stories out in the open. In the end I sensed that they were pleased with their encounter and, as they separated in London, felt they had been part of a wonderful experience.

The stories sound prosaic, don’t they? But, in Smith’s hands, they are anything but dull. They are captivating and full of energy. Each story begs to be completed to alleviate the reader’s curiosity. I found great pleasure in Smith’s gentle approach to life, his careful consideration in the makeup of his characters, and the lack of crudeness in his descriptions of their feelings and relationships. It was a great change from the melange of poor behavior, bloody violence, and moral depravity I’ve been subjected to in most of my recent reading material.

As a reader I was totally absorbed in the material and at peace as I read. There was no turmoil in my mind over the circumstances. I felt as though I was at high tea rather than a raucous beer hall. I was enjoying tea cakes rather than a knuckle sandwich; a string quartet rather than the Rolling Stones. I recommend this book for those who enjoy a good story with elegant and stylish writing and the opportunity to read in comfort. Peace.

Schuyler T Wallace
Author of TIN LIZARD TALES

This is typically an excellent three star story. The statement is not meant ironically. Georges Simenon, for example, wrote books in two moods: a criminal mood and a not that deadly mood. Probably for us to enjoy as readers in corresponding moods. This novel is in a loving mood, not so much abvout Trains: «Loving others, she thought, is the good things we do in our lives»." Others» here are lovers. Or to be wife's and husbands. Or not to be. That is the question. Alexander constructs several ways that lovers cannot be wives, and the stories concerns how "several ways" can be overcome. Or not overcome.

I thought that there would be some connection among the participants on the train that would be revealed- some way- at the end of the story. And preferably that the train would play a role in this connection. I found none, but it may still be there. The train plays a one-second tiny part - literally tiny - in the story apart from letting people speak and listen to each other.

I think the author tries to add some philosophical wisdoms in the text. In one place, there is a statement about the difficulties in speaking emotionally to strangers: " But he felt he could not, because it would be hard to do so; it was never easy to speak about this to complete strangers, which was what they were." (p. 67). However, applying the philosophical U-turn test to this statement: the easiness with which you can speak about emotions to strangers, chances are you will obtain a medium philosophical reputation in both cases.

One of the stories told on the train is summarized with an "Oh". That was indeed "OK".

The language flows easily, but with sufficient resistance not to be boring.

Trains and Lovers is a stand-alone novel by popular Scottish author, Alexander McCall Smith. This novel takes the reader on a train journey where any boredom is dispelled by the stories that four strangers in a railway carriage relate, stories that involve trains (both real and of the art variety) and lovers (variously realised, possibly dangerous and unrequited). McCall Smith gives us four very different characters and chooses a novel way of telling four discrete tales. As always, McCall Smith offers up gentle philosophy as he touches on subjects as diverse as modern-day connectedness and loneliness; identity theft; issues of trust and how powerful and persistent the seeds of doubt, once sown, can be; the comparison of communication today with the bygone era (emails and texts versus telegrams and pen friends); and the concept of moral luck. McCall Smith's prose is charming and evocative: "...wonderful, exotic languages including one that had clicks and whistles in it...It's called !Kung. And it has an exclamation mark in front of it. Imagine talking !English or !French with an exclamation mark. It was lovely to listen to - rather like the sound of the wind in the reeds, or a pair of exotic birds talking to one another on the branch of a tree." And "There are many ways of falling off the high moral ground you've carefully built up for yourself. Moral ground is like that - slippery at the edges." Charming, humorous and insightful.

Contains some mild spoilers.

May I say up front that the cover, while very catchy, is no reflection on the book whatsoever. The story is about four people who meet on a train journey and tell (or in one case, think) about a story of love (requited or otherwise). None of the people are in love with each other. While the cover indicates otherwise, there's no hanky-panky goin' on between these characters.

It's hard to describe the book without giving too much away. A woman tells the story of her parents, who fell in love as penpals and lived out most of their marriage in an isolated part of Australia. This is the most quiet, gentle story about the power of love.

Another is involved with a woman who may or may not be the person she claims to be. Should he go forward---or not?

A third is in love with someone who does not return the love. For me, this was the saddest story, and perhaps the most frustrating because he gives up instead of seeking out another true love.

The fourth is a young man in love for the first time. This story feels more about personal growth and maturity than true love.

So there you have it. It's a gentle read for a lazy summer afternoon or a cozy winter day in front of a fire. Enjoy!

After years of cinematic indoctrination, the train remains the most romantic form of travel. In Trains and Lovers by Alexander McCall Smith (well known for the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series) , four strangers begin talking with each other on the train. During their travels, they share their stories of love. In each story, a train plays a roll in the romance.

People are often more willing to open up to strangers about their deepest emotions. I've had deep and meaningful conversations with strangers on airplanes about religion and family--often sharing much more than I would with my neighbor. Millions of people share the details of their lives on Twitter and other social media. So, it is not surprising that on this trip across England, four people would divulge the stories of their love lives and deepest emotions.

I rather enjoyed the seemingly disconnected stories and the ingenious way Smith manages to tie the various tales together with the train association. The connection does not feel forced but flows naturally as a conversation would. The focus moves to the various forms and types of love.

Trains and Lovers is spare and free from literary fluff. It's a little, afternoon treat. I was thoroughly delighted by the brief tales. Smith, a very talented writer, creates fully developed characters, engaging stories and a thoughtful discussion is such a brief book. Will Strunk and E.B. White would surely be ecstatic by this fabulous example of brevity.

I have read all Alexander McCall Smith's books, and I would give every other book of his a 5. His combination of character development, insights into human nature and relationships, his philosophizing on life and how it should be lived, always delight and inform me. This book I would give a 3.5 star rating. It's good but I didn't love it the way I love his other books. There are four different stories, each told (or thought about) by one of the four people sharing a train compartment on a trip from Scotland to London. Each story is a love story and explores a different aspect of love. I struggle to articulate what was different about this book - I think it may have something to do with the fact that these appear to be characters we will encounter only once, and then never see again, much as they encounter each other. That takes away some of the coziness that you generally get from an AMS book, where the characters are seen again and again in different settings and you watch them change and grow over time as they experience different challenges and situations. It's the difference between encountering your neighbors over and over again throughout a lifetime and meeting someone once on a train. It's a good read, but it may not end up as your favorite AMS.

When Alexander McCall Smith books arrive in this household, other books are dropped, and the book is usually read in one night.

And there's a certain amount of pleasure that remains after the book is finished.

This book doesn't disappoint. It's basically a collection of four short stories, run into one another, told by people on an Edinburgh-London train. None of these characters, not even the narrators, appear in any other McCall Smith book. That's probably why the book falls a little short of the other series of books he's written.

I've been thinking about this. McCall Smith's characters in his series books are so memorable, and you feel so sympathetic and so well-disposed to them, you always want to know what they're doing. I've been thinking that these books are a bit like letters from home - what life has dealt to the familiar faces you like.

This book has mysteries in it, along with descriptions of life in the Outback of Australia. Each story has something to do with trains.

I guess it's best summed up as "If you like McCall Smith, you'll like this book. If you're new to him, you'll probably like it."

Alexander McCall Smith's new book, Trains and Lovers, is a stand-alone novel not tied to any of his series.

"A friendship maybe be conceived in four hours; a short book finished and put away; a life remembered."

I love Alexander McCall Smith's writing style. His characters and stories need no pageantry. He can say so much in so few words! I find it absolutely stunning.

Trains and Lovers dances on the edge of being a collection of four short stories. The four travelers sporadically and spontaneously pause the story with their own introspection or to briefly converse with each other. This brings it all together into one cohesive novel.

Each story held my attention page after page. I couldn't stop reading the mini-mystery that came along with the Englishman's story. But my favorite of all was the Australian woman's account of her parents and the profound impact of their very simple, well-lived, and well-loved life.

Trains and Lovers is an experience; the pages flew by. Alexander McCall Smith did not disappoint!

I received a copy of this book from the publisher via Edelweiss in exchange for an honest review. I did not receive any other compensation for this review.

This is a delightful book...one perfect if you are fortunate enough to be taking a train trip....or even wishing you were!

Four train riders between London and Edinburgh (a trip of under five hours) each tell a story about how a train had a significant impact on their life. The stories are interesting, unexpected, and very much what you would expect from Alexander McCall Smith.

I especially liked Andrew's story. He earns an internship at a prestigious art auction house where he meets the love of his life. In his internship work, a train changes the course of his career. When asked to work on a project with some seventeenth century paintings, he discovers that one includes a tiny train coming through the mountain pass with a tiny plume of steam. He is able to unmask the authenticity of the painting because steam trains were not invented until the next century!

The author does a nice job of winding the stories together and around each other. By the end of the trip, you'll feel that you have gotten to know each of the travelers very well.

Know someone who is a train enthusiast? This is a perfect gift for them.

Having just returned from a train journey that spanned almost 3 weeks, I was taken by the premise of strangers meeting in a train compartment and sharing intimacies. Unlike American trains, the trains that run between Edinburgh and London are comprised of compartments, in which strangers share space for a number of hours. In this book, four such people are compelled to share their stories, much as strangers will do, knowing there will be no repercussions. It's the best kind of therapy. One chooses to keep his story to himself, but the other three have a wealth of experience between them to share. On the journey I recently completed, dinner times were the best since that was when such sharing took place on Amtrak trains. I wish I'd had this book to read with me since its lightness and humor would have gone well with the experience. Alexander McCall-Smith writes with such a deft hand and keen perception that as the miles go, so do the pages.

Alexander McCall Smith is back again, with a charming novel that is sure to burrow its way into your heart and invite itself to stay for a while. His characters are easy to become acquainted with and quite likeable--each with a unique story to tell. If the author himself isn't enough to entice you into picking up this book, the cover illustration will be. With a beautiful depiction of a train passing by and shadows of passengers visible through the windows, it made me wonder what kind of story the book held. Smith writes a wonderful story of how a journey and a few strangers who think they have nearly nothing in common can pass the hours away recalling stories of past and current adventures involving trains and matters of the heart. Although this book was interesting, due to my personal preferences, it was not my favorite style.

www.compassbookratings.com

Three men & a woman come to reminisce how love changed their life.

Romance and railroads. It's like it was written just for me. My family and my in-laws are all Railroad descendants - my grandfather and great grandfather were engineers on the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad from 1872 to 1932.

I have been delighting in Scottish author Alexander McCall Smith's writing since the The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series of novels.

From across the former British empire:
Andrew is a Scottish college graduate traveling to be with his girlfriend and start a job.
English Hugh, in his 20s lives, in Edinburgh and is hoping to find renewed romance in London.
David is the American, in his 40s, and was in Scotland on business.
Australian Kay is in her 50s is returning was on vacation to the country of her ancestors.

It's not a long book but it is lovely.

Keeper

Alexander McCall Smith focuses Trains and Lovers on four people journeying from Edinburgh to London. "This is the story of four people, all strangers to one another, who met on that train, and of how love touched their lives, in very different ways." The trip itself changes from ordinary to memorable when the passengers find themselves opening up to each other.

McCall Smith recounts the individual stories through dialogue, through narration and through interior thoughts. The stories themselves draw you in. Not all the love stories are happy, some are marked by regret and longing. I don't want to spoil anything and the bare details of the love stories don't do them justice. McCall Smith writes so beautifully here and though the book is short, I found myself slowing down to savor his writing.

Alexander McCall Smith's TRAINS AND LOVERS is about four different people and the stories they tell as they're sitting on a train. The stories themselves are pleasant and diverting; there are some moments of genuine feelings (either positive or negative), but most of the stories are told in such a fashion that the only adjective I had for them was "pleasant."

So if you're looking for a nice, no-stress book to read on a train ride, bus ride, or plane ride, this would be a good choice. McCall Smith is a fine writer, really, and this book, while not one of his best (the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency stories hold that distinction), is a solid effort.

Four stars, recommended for those in need of a pleasant, no-stress read.

Barb Caffrey

Entertaining traveling tale that poses the idea of what might happen---and what good stories we would hear---if we would "turn off all devices" and talk to our traveling companions for a change. Travelers telling tales, Geoffrey Chaucer style, with all their humanly failings out for entertainment. (Amusingly, there's even a character named Geoffrey.)

Of course, if you are going to tell stories, they need to be worth reading, and these are. Delightful, tragic, and most of all ironic, it's a slice of the human experience. Stories and dialogue blend harmoniously.

I recommend this book as well as the conversations it might inspire.

(On a site note, I'm a fan of the small format of this book. It's easy to tote around, and nice for my pint sized hands.)

Trains and Lovers by Alexander Smith
Various stories from people who share the train and their life experiences.
Loved the travel each had described and loved the jobs of a few of them: fisherman who lost his oar and the one who had picked up the steam train in a art setting where trains had not even been invented when the painting had been finished.
I have done both things and felt a bond. Didn't care much for the travel to and in Australia, just no bond for me there, seems like such a foreign country with the culture.
I received this book from National Library Service for my BARD (Braille Audio Reading Device).

As someone who has read a considerable number of books by AMS, I can safely say that this near the bottom of his works. A common thread in AMS' s books is a certain moral fiber that define his characters. Often it's exaggerated, but often entertaining. This book is really no different, but due the construction of the book and the forced nature of circumstances, I just think it didn't work this time.

The book has complete strangers on a trian trip spilling their emotional past with not one, but three strangers. The stories themselves were okay, but without his name, it likely would not been published. In many spots it seems that he was just typing and not writing.

So, buy with caution, read with patience.

This intertwined novel set on a trip by rail between Edinburgh and London, shared by four strangers is powerful on several levels. The spare prose sinuously draws the reader into the four narratives. Among other themes, the most personally arresting is how, along with our differences in age, background, and goals, we--as humans--have so much in common. It is good to be reminded that we are all in life's adventure together. Like any chance encounter, we are left with some cliff-hangers as the travelers leave each other at King's Cross, which in no way diminish the tales.