Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn - Book Review

Gone Girl is a page-turner. Reading it, I was taken for a ride--one that I'd rather forget.  

It's Nick Dunne and Amy Dunne's fifth wedding anniversary one summer morning in North Carthage, Missouri. Nick drives home. His front door is open; His wife is gone. He calls the police, and they mount an investigation. From the start, Nick is their primary suspect.

Pressure builds. The police, the media, Amy's parents, the American public, all of them searching for answers, and for Amy. Unfortunately, Nick is a liar. He lies, deceives, and plots. He acts inappropriately, like laughing when he's supposed to frown. He seems guilty, but is he?

Nick stands by his innocence. His twin sister Margo lends her support. But if Nick didn't do it, who did?

Lies, Lies, All Lies!

Ben Affleck plays Nick Dunne in the upcoming Gone Girl movie adaptation. 

Rosamund Pike (in missing person's poster) plays Amy Dunne.

Gone Girl is a gripping read. The story is told from Nick's and Amy's first-person points of view. Nick's chapters are all set in the story's present. Amy's chapters begin with entries from her personal diary. Sadly, they're both serial liars.

I distrusted both narrators. There were no cleverly-hidden clues to discover, no revelations to steadily build towards. There was only a mountain of lies. Also, buried truths dug-up and thrown at me like soil shoveled on a dead man's grave. It doesn't make sense, I know.

What I do know is Gillian Flynn wrote her characters well. Everything she wrote about Nick and Amy I believed, both the truths and the lies. She made me both love and hate Nick. Despite his lying and cheating, I wanted him to be innocent, no matter how much everyone in the story disliked and distrusted him.

When it was revealed that Amy was alive, I should have been happy. Nick was innocent. But all I could think about was how I wanted Amy dead, dead, dead! I hate Amy! She is one of the most evil literary characters I've ever read. She's crazy-ass smart, and she whoops Nick's ass all the way till the end. Poor Nick!


Entertainment Weekly 2014 Preview featuring Gone Girl

Craziness is scary. But one particular scene in Gone Girl nearly made me scream in public. Nick was at home. He was speaking with his lawyer Tanner Bolt on the phone. He kept looking up the stairs, making sure Amy wasn't listening-in. The conversation turned sour. Nick swore, ended the call. Then this happened:

"I turned around, and Amy was on the bottom stair in her nightgown, her head tilted to one side. 'Play nice, Nick.'"

Blame it on my watching too many episodes of Criminal Minds and Hannibal, but when I read this scene, I feared the worst for Nick. But something even worse happened--Nick decided to live happily ever after with his crazy wife. Now how mind-fudged is that?

Fortunately, Gone Girl movie adaptation director David Fincher has been dropping hints about deviating from his source material. Whether or not he's talking about changing the ending remains to be seen. I'm excited to watch the upcoming movie starring Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike this October.

As for the novel, I think Gillian Flynn's work deserves a 4 out of 5.