Gone Girl: Book Review

This book blew up on 2012 lists of best books. You couldn’t look on a 2012 book list without seeing Gone Girl listed. A psychological thriller, a missing wife, clues that keep piling up and keep you turning the pages—what more could you ask for? (As it turns out, mixing all the best things together can make a really bad thing, as Tracy Morgan figured out on 30 Rock by trying to mix all great forms of music into one song, but I digress). It’s called a dark thriller for a reason, you know.

The day of Nick and Amy’s wedding anniversary, Amy disappears without a trace. As the police investigate, the clues seem to point toward Nick as the cause for her disappearance, and maybe even murder. Though it doesn’t look good for Nick because he’d been keeping things from the police, he maintains his innocence. Things aren’t always as they appear….

This is a great theme of the book. The book is written from alternating views of Nick and Amy, which really messes with your brain. If there’s anything to be said, it’s that your view of a character can be completely changed, chapter to chapter, depending on the point of view. This is another interesting point; the same situation with the same facts and events can be manipulated to manipulate the reader, and it gets even more complicated when some facts are revealed and others withheld. The presentation is the thing.

Flynn’s strong suit in the book is presenting these situations to you in order to get you to feel a certain way, but just when you have a handle on the characters and have an idea of what really happened, she rips the rug from under your feet and presents new facts, another point of view. While some people complain that it’s not fair to the reader to play with their emotions, I would like to remind them that this is a psychological thriller, and that is the best part of suspense. Presenting everything all at once wouldn’t be exciting, and this wouldn’t be a good suspenseful story.

I can’t promise that you will like any of the characters. I have to remind myself time and again that it is not a necessary part of literature (to have likeable characters), but it does help in certain books. In The Yonahlossee Riding Camp for Girls, apart from atrocious decision-making and a lack of morals (or any lesson-learning whatsoever), the main character is not likeable at all. In that case, it wasn’t a good choice since empathy is a necessary part of that coming-of-age tale. Gone Girl’s not necessarily likeable characters improve the story and play up on the reader’s perception of the story, what actually happened, who did it, and can completely change the ending of the book.

Boy, did this list creator get at least one thing right, am I right?

I don’t want to ruin anything, and a lot of this novel depends on not knowing, so I will end it here. It might be worth mentioning that this book was “featured” on Orange is the New Black, the Netflix original series. However, Piper Chapman, one of the main characters, clearly didn’t like it as much as I did. Which means the writers didn’t like it very much. This is odd, considering crime and drama are their specialties. They could at least admit that, most opinions set aside, though you may have a full seat, all you will need is the edge.

Oh, and you're a great judge of character, aren't you?

Rating: 8.75 out of 10 stars

You might want to check out Gillian Flynn’s previous novels, if you liked her writing or suspense style, Dark Places and Sharp Objects (Dark Places didn’t really appeal to me, but Sharp Objects seemed interesting). You might also like The Shining Girls by Lauren Beukes, though it is worth noting that that one is more about serial killers and time travelling—it’s gripping and I have to give Ms. Beukes props for such an interesting concept.