A review by aeoliandeductress
Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

4.0

I actually read this as part of The Complete Works of Gillian Flynn and thus have been keeping tabs on my progress over there. Still, it seems a shame not to review each book individually.

My sister had heard good things about the movie- knowing that I'm a bit of a movie fanatic, she encouraged me to watch it. As a rule, if a movie is based on a popular book (or I'm aware it's based on a book at all), I generally read the book first.

Gone Girl sucked me in right away. The rotating viewpoints kept me interested, kept me guessing, and kept me dizzy a bit. Oddly enough, I did not LIKE diary Amy so much as want to shake her in part one, but perhaps that was just me. From here on out, it gets tricky to write a review without spoilers, so the rest will be hidden. Suffice it to say that while I enjoyed the book as I read it, and while I respect and even admire Flynn's choice of an ending, it left me wanting in a way that keeps me from giving the book the full five stars or likely reading it ever again.

Spoiler

Okay, seriously? Amy the murderess gets to win? I get that she is clever and I get that Desi wasn't great, but what about poetic justice? I really wanted Jacqueline, his mother, to take her down. I get why Nick couldn't- get that he couldn't outwit her or at minimum had too much to lose. But I wanted someone to take this bitch down so BAD. I had my suspicions she was faking her death early, but for such petty reasons left me unable to find any redeemable and likeable aspects of her character. Flynn made a bold choice for an ending and I suppose, in some ways, given the characters, a more realistic and definitely a darker one. But it left me deeply unsatisfied with the ending and just wanting Amy to meet a foul end. End of rant- enjoy.