Night Train is sometimes heavy with theme, shadowy with nuance, but it is never difficult to follow. Hoolihan and her fellow police want this to be a murder. And a suicide is no damn use to anyone. Give us the how, then give us the who, we say. But fuck the why.
Same thing goes for the reader of a mystery novel.
When we open a mystery novel, there is a tacit understanding that by the time we close it we are going to have some answers. Night Train has been compared to books by Hammett and Chandler, yet there are equal measures of Camus and Pascal in it. Such a book promises no answers. This tension is what gives Night Train much of its energy, but it might drive mystery buffs to distraction. Amis, though, believes he has made a perfect match.