Book Review: Gone Girl
This book messed me up.
Not emotionally or psychologically (though it certainly does put your mind through its paces and casually and continually flips you on your head) – it messed up my schedule. Quite severely.
See, my plan was to do a bit of light reading after waking up on Saturday morning (alright, afternoon) still warmly snuggled in bed. I thought I’d read for a half hour, maybe an hour, then get on with my day, clean my apartment, get groceries, do laundry, run a few errands… you know. After all, Sunday was Mother’s Day and I had a lot to get done before then.
Guess how much of that I actually accomplished? None of it. Absolutely none of it. If I hadn’t finished the book by Saturday evening I might have skipped out on mum entirely. (Of course I wouldn’t really.)
Instead, this is what my day looked like from start to finish.
Now, there’s not a whole lot I can say about Gone Girl without giving the game away. Like The Hound of the Baskervilles, this one’s a mystery. Well, half mystery, half thriller – and an all-around exhilarating, extraordinary ride. It will have you gasping aloud more than once and leave you dizzy and disoriented long after you’ve put it down. I can say with confidence that this is definitely unlike anything I’ve ever read before, of any genre.
I’ll give you the setup, which is what you’ll see in the movie trailer, so hopefully this doesn’t spoil too much. If you like to go into a book completely blind, though, don’t read any further – just pick up a copy and thank me later.
So: boy meets girl. Nick and Amy are the perfect couple. They’re madly in love, gorgeous, wealthy, funny, laid-back, and charismatic. After a short stint of marital bliss, life hands them a few hardships. Nick loses his job due to the recession, quickly followed by Amy losing hers, and they’re forced to relocate their lives from glamourous, fast-paced New York, to slow, dreary Missouri. This, among other things, creates a great strain on their marriage. On the morning of their fifth wedding anniversary, Amy vanishes from their home with signs of struggle. As the investigation unfolds and clues come to light, things don’t quite add up and lies begin to unravel.
It’s written from both Nick’s perspective and Amy’s (told in flashback through her diary entries) and the true nature of their relationship is unveiled sliver by precious sliver by each of them.
To me, there’s nothing more fun than a book written by a whip-smart author. Gillian Flynn is exactly that. Her understanding of people and the relationships between them is nuanced and unflinchingly honest. Her immaculate crafting of plot is so fine that each page and every chapter left me awed. The whole thing reads like a bowstring drawn taut, and you’ll be holding your breath waiting for its release.
I absolutely loved it. If I had to sum Gone Girl up in one word, it would be: wow. Though I don’t actually like how it ended, that didn’t detract from my experience and enjoyment of the book as a whole.
I eagerly recommend this to absolutely anyone. Run to the nearest bookstore and buy a copy, order it online here, or try to get it from the library. If none of these methods work, here’s the audiobook. But shhh, you didn’t get it from me.
Let me just say that I am counting down the days until the movie’s release in October. Hopefully they do it justice.
Have you read Gone Girl? If you have, what did you think of it? Leave a comment! x
Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn – My Rating: 4.8/5
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