Title: Gone Girl
Author: Gillian Flynn
Publisher: Crown Publishing Group
Genre: Mystery Thriller, Psychological thriller
First Publication: 2012
Language: English
Major Characters: Nick Dunne, Amy Elliot Dunne, Margo “Go” Dunne, Rand Elliot, Marybeth Elliot, Jim Gilpin, Rhonda Boney, Tanner Bolt, Andie Hardy, Desi Collings
Setting Place: North Carthage, Missouri
Theme: Secrets and Lies in Marriage, Misogyny, Writing, Storytelling, and Narrative
Narrator: First person, alternating between Nick and Amy’s points of view from chapter to chapter.
Book Summary: Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn centers its story about Nick and Amy Dunne’s strained marriage relationship. Nick used to work as a journalist, but loses his job. With his broke financial status, Nick decides to relocate from New York City to his smaller home town, North Carthage.
In an attempt of recovering from his financial deprivations, Nick opens a bar using the money from his wife. Nick runs the bar along with his twin sister Margo, providing a decent living for his family. But, as they days go by, his marriage with Amy is falling apart slowly. Amy resents her new life.
“There’s something disturbing about recalling a warm memory and feeling utterly cold.”
On a summer morning in Missouri, when Nick and Amy are celebrating their fifth wedding anniversary along with their relatives and acquaintances, Amy goes missing.
Police’s eyes turn towards Nick as an act of suspicion, since Nick used Amy’s money for his business and their relationship is strained. As the police delve into the investigation, different shades of stories come out from Nick’s and Amy’s sides. The suspense of the book is carried until the actual information is demystified.
The book, Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn, is also available on Audible. It’s narrated by Christiane Paul, Matthias Koeberlin.
Book Review: Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
I’ve read Gillian Flynn’s previous two novels Sharp Objects and Dark Places and I liked them both! I thought she is an ingenious writer, and there is no doubt about it. She is one of the most genius authors I have read in recent times. Her books are exemplary and make deep impact on your mind! She has ability to surprise you in the most unexpected ways. Her stories have everything I look for in a good mystery book. Twists, characters that jump out of the pages and a clever plot.
Gillian Flynn is an ingenious, spectacular author. Reading her books feels like falling down into a dark rabbit hole. Her stories are full of mystery, twists, lies, secrets, revelations and have all the nasty characters. When I started reading Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn, I was surprised by how different it was compared to her previous works. Flynn creates very dark and violent stories with very, very disturbed characters. But in this book the dark macabre tendency that dominates her writing contrasts with the beautiful New York skyline that the story is set against to.
“There’s a difference between really loving someone and loving the idea of her.”
In her previous books we met dark characters with many flaws and nasty places that you would not like to find yourself too. But in this book the places were beautiful, the characters were popular, rich, gorgeous. Almost perfect. I really wondered if this was actually the same author that wrote those dark stories in the past. Well, this is what I thought for the first part of Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn.
The first part of the book is divided into two stories. The first story is one of those stories that you see in cheesy romantic movies. A beautiful love story, set in New York with gorgeous characters that kiss under clouds of sugar. Or so it seems. Because the characters hide their darker side. The second story is a mystery story of a man that lost his wife and he is accused of her murder. But then right in the middle of the book a wicked twist changes everything. The story transforms to Flynn’s regular stories that are dark, full of twists and gory.
“Love makes you want to be a better man—right, right. But maybe love, real love, also gives you permission to just be the man you are.”
Gillian Flynn takes the common marital concerns about money, in-laws, and parenthood, and turns them into toxic waste in the case of Nick and Amy Dunne. Amy is revealed through her diaries, and Nick narrates his experiences as he follows the clues in the anniversary treasure hunt laid out by his wife before she disappeared.
From the first page I was hooked to the story. The mystery had me guessing and the love story made me to want to find out more. But it is the second part that made me not to able to stop reading! This book is full of twists. Twists that hit you like asteroids and keep you on the edge of your seat the whole time. The twists and turns are so many and so unexpected that you just cannot predict what will happen next!
But where Gillian Flynn does the best work is in the characters. Characters are amazingly developed here. This is the main aspect that makes her story so good. Her ability to create multidimensional characters is exceptional. A good psychological mystery really lies upon characters and Flynn’s characters in this book can really carry a story that surprises you constantly. The story is unfolded between two point of view. This choice of narration is what makes the book so great. Seeing the story through the eyes of two characters keeps you guessing till the end!
“It’s humbling, to become the very thing you once mocked.”
Every single detail is important and it turns the reader towards another direction. The ending of Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn was so unexpected. There are people who love it and those who hate it. Two pages before the book ends, Flynn throws a huge twist that you either hate or love. Personally I loved it. I don’t think that there could be a more fitting end to this mystery thriller. It is one of those books that you finish and you can’t stop thinking about.
