Gone Girl: Review

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

The story begins on Amy and Nick's fifth wedding anniversary. Nick returns home to find his house has been ransacked and Amy is missing. The police suspect him immediately especially as there seems to be an unexplained gaping hole in his alibi.

We are then taken back in time to when Nick and Amy first met, told through Amy's diary. Amy is an spoilt rich girl who analyses the world through personality quizes. She has a Sex and the City vibe about her and I liked her quirky personality. Nick seemed an ordinary kind of guy and I hoped he hadn't killed Amy, but guessed he probably had.

As the story unfolds through Nick's voice in the present, with the cops and his in-laws and the media turning against him, and through Amy's diary in the past as she dissects their marriage through the years, we begin to feel sorry for Amy. She had a childhood unlike any other, which included the wonderful folly of 'Amazing Amy', her parents' books based on a perfect child, so work and marriage just couldn't live up to expectations.

Gillian Flynn's writing seems flimsy and light, yet we realise, as the characters are slowly revealed, that the writing is actually strong and deliberate. We never know which characters we dislike more yet are drawn to reading on to know what happens. By the end I disliked them and felt sorry for them in equal measures. I was amazed at how my opinion of each character changed as the author brought me through each twist and turn.

I chose to buy this as an audio book and think it was probably enhanced by the narration. Even in my head I wouldn't have been able to sustain that New York spoilt-girl voice of Amy. Great narration by Julia Whelan and Kirby Heyborne.

Dark Places and Sharp Objects are Gillian Flynn's two other novels which I'm looking forward to reading sometime soon.