Gone Girl

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

Told in three parts, Gone Girl tells the story of the marriage of Amy Elliott and Nick Dunne. While reading Book 1, one gets the feeling that Nick is the story’s protagonist. By the time I reached Book 2, I realized that the actual protagonist is the marriage. More specifically, the lead role is that of the conch of power within the marriage.

In some ways, this is the most horrifying of Flynn’s novels. Whereas Sharp Objects and Dark Places occur decades after the horror that initiates the action, Gone Girl takes you through all of the horror as it happens. It’s good, but it could have been great.

Gone Girl is Gillian Flynn’s third novel. It was very much a Gillian Flynn novel. I like it, but I did not love it. I probably would have liked it a lot more if I hadn’t read both of Flynn’s first two novels. I might’ve enjoyed it more had I read it without knowing who wrote it. This was a novel whose impression on me was damaged by my familiarity with the author. Throughout Book 1, I felt I knew what was coming, that everything I was reading was a lie.

Flynn utilizes the alternating POV chapter technique that she used to near perfection in Dark Places. Odd-numbered chapters are told from Nick’s point of view; the even-numbered ones from Amy’s. In Book 1, which builds the story and interest, Amy’s portion of the story is told through selected diary entries.

The middle, Book 2, was not solid. In fact, it bored me. Now that I’m finished with the book, I find Book 2 unnecessary. More damning, I think it killed the suspense that Book 3 would have carried. Flynn has a tendency to fully explain her reveals. It answered questions before they were asked. At a macro level, I understand why Flynn included it. Much of Gone Girl’s social commentary resides there. It took away from the story she was trying to tell, though. It hurt the novel. Book 2's biggest flaw is that its version of Amy reads false compared to every other version of her that we see (Book 1, Book 2, and testimony of other characters). By the end of that section, Gone Girl was a D+ novel.

In Book 3, Flynn ties everything together into a very good ending. It takes a story and people you know and creates a very realistic hell on earth. It might be the best ending of her three novels. It is definitely the most frightening of her endings.

Gone Girl was uneven. Solid beginning; boring, meandering middle. Gillian Flynn stuck the landing, though, and that saved it.

C