Gone Girl (Mr.'s take)

Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl is a fast paced murder mystery/thriller that keeps you turning the page, and it’s definitely worth recommending.  Mrs. already did a great job of recapping the novel, so I won’t do that.  Instead I’ll just hit a few points:

So let’s discuss the book’s ending.  There seems to be some controversy regarding it, or at least it seems to have upset some readers (including readers in our family).  What Flynn doesn’t give the reader is justice, at least in terms of the character that committed a crime being punished, but I don’t think that makes it a bad ending.  My opinion is that it’s about the best ending I could have expected.  I don’t need my fictional stories to have everything resolved in the end with a “and they lived happily ever after . . .”, so this was fitting.  Nick the self-absorbed ass has to live with his crazy wife, Desi is dead (and really he probably had that coming), and Amy . . . well, I guess like Nick says, she has to be herself and maybe that’s punishment enough.  And the rest is left to your imagination.  Do the police (or at least Boney) keep looking at Amy’s story and does she eventually get caught (not likely)?  Does Amy eventually frame Nick for something or kill him or worse – just stay married to him (more likely)?  Or do they grow old together until their animosity towards each other eventually resembles pretty much every old married couple?  The reader might not get the desired resolution, but no one is really worse off.  Well, except their unborn child.  That kid could be in some trouble.

After reading Gone Girl the real question is whether I need to be frightened of Mrs.’ semi-obsession with Investigation Discovery and shows that involves crimes (the crime being murder in most cases – and specifically one spouse killing the other)?  Is it possible that she's planning the perfect crime?  Should I watch her more closely to ensure she’s not taking notes?

Mrs. also mentioned in a post that we attended a book reading with Gillian Flynn.  One of the things she discussed was how long it took to write her first novels since she was working full time (albeit as a magazine writer – not sure if that would make it harder or easier to motivate yourself to write when work was over).  This gives hope to those of us who would love to write but still have to go to a full time job.  We just have to give up weekends, holidays, etc. to tell our story.  She also mentioned that she had just completed the screenplay for the Gone Girl movie, so she’s keeping busy writing (although she no longer has that magazine job).

Mrs. is going to read Sharp Objects (Flynn's debut novel) at some point this year (my mother and SIL already have), so once I get the consensus on that I’ll determine if I want to check out Ms. Flynn’s first two books.  But I am looking forward to what she does next.

Next up:  Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane