The Book I'm Carrying Around: Gone Girl

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Ever thought of killing someone?  Think you could get away with it?  Probably not, because you probably aren't patient enough and you would let your emotions get involved.  Either you'd move impulsively because they made you mad or you would change your mind because you realized you loved the person afterall.  To really get away with it, you have to have a plan, be patient, and ignore all your emotions.  Otherwise, like most criminals, you'll mess it up and get caught.

I don't read suspense thrillers/crime dramas too often - and I don't know why because I am such a "CSI" addict.  I didn't know what this was about or what to expect, other than that some girl was missing, which I figured out from the title, but once I got to about page 2, I was hooked.

* No spoilers here; in fact, I could tell you exactly what happened and you would still need to read the book to believe me that that's what happened.  But I won't, so continue.... *

We open on Nick and Amy's fifth wedding anniversary (with the traditional gift of "wood") and quickly realize that their marriage, like most marriages, is a mix of love, sacrifice, and compromise.  Unlike (or like?) most marriages, there's also a bit of bitterness and betrayal.  When Nick is called home from his bar, which he co-owns with his twin sister, Margo, and has been financed by his wife, he finds his cat wandering outside his open front door and his wife gone.  The police come, the in-laws are called in, he confides in his sister, all kinds of folks from both Nick and Amy's past are visited.  And of course, I am, as always, as everyone is, sure that the husband did it - its just a question of "how" and "why"?

And its the "how" and "why" that kept this book constantly in my hands - at the pool, waiting for the kids, laying out on the hammock, late at night.  And wondering, if I could ever pull off such a feat.  (Not that I would, but when you watch a crime show, don't you wonder whether you could get away with it?)

There are so many plot twists and revelations, that I constantly was turning back to previous pages to see if I had read a detail correctly the first time or exclaiming "ohhhh, that's what he/she meant" or "oh, sugar! how'd he/she do that?!"  It got to the point, I didn't even know whose side I was on in this marriage debacle.  By the time I figured out what was going on, the story took off in another direction and took me with it.

Great story, great characters.  I'm off to find one of Gillian Flynn's previous books, I feel like I've been left out of a great secret.


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