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Gone Girl: A Novel [Hardcover]

Gillian Flynn
3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10,932 customer reviews)

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Book Description

June 5, 2012

Marriage can be a real killer. 
   One of the most critically acclaimed suspense writers of our time, New York Times bestseller Gillian Flynn takes that statement to its darkest place in this unputdownable masterpiece about a marriage gone terribly, terribly wrong. The Chicago Tribune proclaimed that her work “draws you in and keeps you reading with the force of a pure but nasty addiction.” Gone Girl’s toxic mix of sharp-edged wit and deliciously chilling prose creates a nerve-fraying thriller that confounds you at every turn. 
   On a warm summer morning in North Carthage, Missouri, it is Nick and Amy Dunne’s fifth wedding anniversary. Presents are being wrapped and reservations are being made when Nick’s clever and beautiful wife disappears from their rented McMansion on the Mississippi River. Husband-of-the-Year Nick isn’t doing himself any favors with cringe-worthy daydreams about the slope and shape of his wife’s head, but passages from Amy's diary reveal the alpha-girl perfectionist could have put anyone dangerously on edge. Under mounting pressure from the police and the media—as well as Amy’s fiercely doting parents—the town golden boy parades an endless series of lies, deceits, and inappropriate behavior. Nick is oddly evasive, and he’s definitely bitter—but is he really a killer? 
   As the cops close in, every couple in town is soon wondering how well they know the one that they love. With his twin sister, Margo, at his side, Nick stands by his innocence. Trouble is, if Nick didn’t do it, where is that beautiful wife? And what was in that silvery gift box hidden in the back of her bedroom closet?
   With her razor-sharp writing and trademark psychological insight, Gillian Flynn delivers a fast-paced, devilishly dark, and ingeniously plotted thriller that confirms her status as one of the hottest writers around.


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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Amazon Best Books of the Month, June 2012: On the day of their fifth wedding anniversary, Nick's wife Amy disappears. There are signs of struggle in the house and Nick quickly becomes the prime suspect. It doesn't help that Nick hasn't been completely honest with the police and, as Amy's case drags out for weeks, more and more vilifying evidence appears against him. Nick, however, maintains his innocence. Told from alternating points of view between Nick and Amy, Gillian Flynn creates an untrustworthy world that changes chapter-to-chapter. Calling Gone Girl a psychological thriller is an understatement. As revelation after revelation unfolds, it becomes clear that the truth does not exist in the middle of Nick and Amy's points of view; in fact, the truth is far more dark, more twisted, and more creepy than you can imagine. Gone Girl is masterfully plotted from start to finish and the suspense doesn't waver for one page. It's one of those books you will feel the need to discuss immediately after finishing because the ending doesn't just come; it punches you in the gut. --Caley Anderson

From Author Gillian Flynn

You might say I specialize in difficult characters. Damaged, disturbed, or downright nasty. Personally, I love each and every one of the misfits, losers, and outcasts in my three novels. My supporting characters are meth tweakers, truck-stop strippers, backwoods grifters ...

But it's my narrators who are the real challenge.

In Sharp Objects, Camille Preaker is a mediocre journalist fresh from a stay at a psychiatric hospital. She's an alcoholic. She's got impulse issues. She's also incredibly lonely. Her best friend is her boss. When she returns to her hometown to investigate a child murder, she parks down the street from her mother's house "so as to seem less obtrusive." She has no sense of whom to trust, and this leads to disaster.

Camille is cut off from the world but would rather not be. In Dark Places, narrator Libby Day is aggressively lonely. She cultivates her isolation. She lives off a trust fund established for her as a child when her family was massacred; she isn't particularly grateful for it. She's a liar, a manipulator, a kleptomaniac. "I have a meanness inside me, real as an organ," she warns. "Draw a picture of my soul and it'd be a scribble with fangs." If Camille is overly grateful when people want to befriend her, Libby's first instinct is to kick them in their shins.

In those first two novels, I explored the geography of loneliness--and the devastation it can lead to. With Gone Girl, I wanted to go the opposite direction: what happens when two people intertwine their lives completely.I wanted to explore the geography of intimacy--and the devastation it can lead to. Marriage gone toxic.

Gone Girl opens on the occasion of Amy and Nick Dunne's fifth wedding anniversary. (How romantic.) Amy disappears under very disturbing circumstances. (Less romantic.) Nick and Amy Dunne were the golden couple when they first began their courtship. Soul mates. They could complete each other's sentences, guess each other's reactions. They could push each other's buttons. They are smart, charming, gorgeous, and also narcissistic, selfish, and cruel.

They complete each other--in a very dangerous way.

Review

“Ice-pick-sharp… Spectacularly sneaky… Impressively cagey… Gone Girl is Ms. Flynn’s dazzling breakthrough. It is wily, mercurial, subtly layered and populated by characters so well imagined that they’re hard to part with — even if, as in Amy’s case, they are already departed. And if you have any doubts about whether Ms. Flynn measures up to Patricia Highsmith’s level of discreet malice, go back and look at the small details. Whatever you raced past on a first reading will look completely different the second time around.”
—Janet Maslin, New York Times

“An ingenious and viperish thriller… It’s going to make Gillian Flynn a star… The first half of Gone Girl is a nimble, caustic riff on our Nancy Grace culture and the way in which ''The butler did it'' has morphed into ''The husband did it.'' The second half is the real stunner, though. Now I really am going to shut up before I spoil what instantly shifts into a great, breathless read. Even as Gone Girl grows truly twisted and wild, it says smart things about how tenuous power relations are between men and women, and how often couples are at the mercy of forces beyond their control. As if that weren’t enough, Flynn has created a genuinely creepy villain you don't see coming. People love to talk about the banality of evil. You’re about to meet a maniac you could fall in love with.”
Jeff Giles, Entertainment Weekly

“An irresistible summer thriller with a twisting plot worthy of Alfred Hitchcock. Burrowing deep into the murkiest corners of the human psyche, this delectable summer read will give you the creeps and keep you on edge until the last page.”
—People (four stars)

“[A] thoroughbred thriller about the nature of identity and the terrible secrets that can survive and thrive in even the most intimate relationships. Gone Girl begins as a whodunit, but by the end it will have you wondering whether there’s any such thing as a who at all.”
Lev Grossman, Time

“How did things get so bad? That’s the reason to read this book. Gillian Flynn — whose award-winning Dark Places and Sharp Objects also shone a dark light on weird and creepy, not to mention uber dysfunctional characters — delves this time into what happens when two people marry and one spouse has no idea who their beloved really is.”
USA Today, Carol Memmott

“It’s simply fantastic: terrifying, darkly funny and at times moving. The minute I finished it I wanted to start it all over again. Admirers of Gillian Flynn’s previous books, Sharp Objects and Dark Places, will be ecstatic over Gone Girl, her most intricately twisted and deliciously sinister story, dangerous for any reader who prefers to savor a novel as opposed to consuming it whole in one sitting….”
Associated Press, Michelle Weiner

“Gillian Flynn’s third novel is both breakneck-paced thriller and masterful dissection of marital breakdown… Wickedly plotted and surprisingly thoughtful, this is a terrifically good read.”
Boston Globe

“That adage of no one knows what goes on behind closed doors moves the plot of Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn's suspenseful psychological thriller… Flynn's unpredictable plot of Gone Girl careens down an emotional highway where this couple dissects their marriage with sharp acumen… Flynn has shown her skills at gripping tales and enhanced character studies since her debut Sharp Objects, which garnered an Edgar nod, among other nominations. Her second novel Dark Places made numerous best of lists. Gone Girl reaffirms her talent.” 
South Florida Sun-Sentinel, Oline Cogdill

“A great crime novel, however, is an unstable thing, entertainment and literature suspended in some undetermined solution. Take Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl, the third novel by one of a trio of contemporary women writers (the others are Kate Atkinson and Tana French) who are kicking the genre into a higher gear… You couldn’t say that this is a crime novel that’s ultimately about a marriage, which would make it a literary novel in disguise. The crime and the marriage are inseparable. As Gone Girl works itself up into an aria of ingenious, pitch-black comedy (or comedic horror — it’s a bit of both), its very outlandishness teases out a truth about all magnificent partnerships: Sometimes it’s your enemy who brings out the best in you, and in such cases, you want to keep him close.”
Salon
 
“Ms. Flynn writes dark suspense novels that anatomize violence without splashing barrels of blood around the pages… But as in her other books, Ms. Flynn has much more up her sleeve than a simple missing-person case. As Nick and Amy's alternately tell their stories, marriage has never looked so menacing, narrators so unreliable.” 
Wall Street Journal

“A portrait of a marriage so hilariously terrifying, it will make you have a good hard think about who the person on the other side of the bed really is. This novel is so bogglingly twisty, we can only give you the initial premise: on their fifth anniversary, Nick Dunne’s beloved wife Amy disappears, and all signs point to very foul play indeed. Nick has to clear his name before the police finger him for Amy’s murder.”
Time

“Readers who prefer more virulent strains of unreality will appreciate the sneaky mind games of Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl, a thriller rooted in the portrait of a tricky and troubled marriage.”
New York Times

“[Flynn has] quite outdone herself with a tale of marital strife so deliciously devious that it moves the finish line on The War of the Roses… A novel studded with disclosures and guided by purposeful misdirection… Flynn delivers a wickedly clever cultural commentary as well as a complex and driven mystery… What fun this novel is.”
New York Daily News
 
“Flynn’s brilliantly constructed and consistently absorbing third novel begins on the Dunnes’ fifth wedding anniversary… The novel, which twists itself into new shapes, works as a page-turning thriller, but it’s also a study of marriage at its most destructive.”
Columbus Dispatch
 
“Gillian Flynn's barbed and brilliant Gone Girl has two deceitful, disturbing, irresistible narrators and a plot that twists so many times you'll be dizzy. This "catastrophically romantic" story about Nick and Amy is a "fairy tale reverse transformation" that reminded me of Patricia Highsmith in its psychological suspense and Kate Atkinson in its insanely clever plotting.”
Minneapolis Star-Tribune
 
“For a creepy, suspenseful mystery, Ms. Pearl suggested Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn, a novel due out this week. "You will not be able to figure out the end at all. I could not sleep the night after I read it. It's really good," Ms. [Nancy] Pearl said. "It's about the way we deceive ourselves and deceive others."”
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

“Gillian Flynn's new novel, Gone Girl, is that rare thing: a book that thrills and delights while holding up a mirror to how we live… Through her two ultimately unreliable narrators, Flynn masterfully weaves the slow trickle of critical details with 90-degree plot turns… Timely, poignant and emotionally rich, Gone Girl will peel away your comfort levels even as you root for its protagonists—despite your best intuition.”
San Francisco Chronicle
 
“Flynn’s third noir thriller recently launched to even more acclaim than the first two novels, polishing her reputation for pushing crime fiction to a new literary level and as a craftsman of deliciously twisting and twisted plots.”
Kansas City Star
 
“I picked up Gone Girl because the novel is set along the Mississippi River in Missouri and the plot sounded intriguing. I put it down two days later, bleary-eyed and oh-so-satisfied after reading a story that left me surprised, disgusted, and riveted by its twists and turns… A good story presents a reader with a problem that has to be resolved and a few surprises along the way. A great story gives a reader a problem and leads you along a path, then dumps you off a cliff and into a jungle of plot twists, character revelations and back stories that you could not have imagined. Gone Girl does just that.”
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

“To call Gillian Flynn's new novel almost review-proof isn't a put-down, it's a fact. That's because to give away the turn-of-the-screw in this chilling portrait of a marriage gone wrong would be a crime. I can say that Gone Girl is an ingenious whodunit for both the Facebook generation and old-school mystery buffs. Whoever you are, it will linger, like fingerprints on a gun… Flynn's characters bloom and grow, like beautiful, poisonous plants. She is a Gothic storyteller for the Internet age.”
Cleveland Plain Dealer

“The setup of Gone Girl lulls readers with what appears to be a done-too-often plot, but, oh, how misleading that is. This thriller is told in alternating voices, a risky form of narrative that works masterfully here because th...

Product Details

  • Hardcover: 432 pages
  • Publisher: Crown; First Edition edition (June 5, 2012)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 030758836x
  • ISBN-13: 978-0297859383
  • ASIN: 030758836X
  • Product Dimensions: 1.6 x 6.5 x 9.5 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10,931 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #41 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Customer Reviews

The book has many twists and turns that keeps you surprised and intrigued up to the very end. Plain-O Book Club of Plano, Tx  |  2,307 reviewers made a similar statement
I really wanted to like this book, but the ending was just terrible! K. Brooks  |  685 reviewers made a similar statement
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1,688 of 1,788 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars Fiendishly clever mystery novel May 8, 2012
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)
In the first few pages of Gillian Flynn's new novel Gone Girl, I was thinking, "This is it -- one of those rare novels that's unique and totally engrossing, cleverly plotted so that each new development has me astounded and eager to find out what happens next." Then the story continued as Midwestern husband Nick began to deal with his wife Amy's sudden disappearance and some gradually revealed details that might cast doubt on his own innocence in the matter. During that time, the book dropped down from the level of extraordinary to merely somewhat intriguing. However, once I reached Part Two of Gone Girl ("Boy Meets Girl"), it was like Ms Flynn kicked it up a notch, and the book became amazing again. Without giving any spoilers, Part Two unveils some major plot twists that cast Amy's status in an entirely new light. From that point on, the story moves along in powder keg fashion: the fuse has been lit, and it's only a question of how long 'til the explosion, and how much damage will be done when it happens. Flynn has a distinctive writing style that really involved me in what was going on with her two main characters. I had previously purchased but not yet read her Sharp Objects (after several recommendations). Now I will have to read it, and also get her first book, Dark Places. Only one warning, though: Gone Girl contains a fair amount of foul language. This was not a problem for me, but it might be for some readers.
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471 of 522 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars An Irresistible Slow Burn April 8, 2012
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)
Marguerite Yourcenar wrote long ago that "the mask, given time, comes to be the face itself." This can work for good or bad, but the more hideous the secrets, the more carefully that mask is constructed. So what if you discovered after five years of marriage that you'd only seen the mask, and never the real face of your spouse? Once those dark truths were revealed, could you stay married to that person?

Knowledge is power, and never more so than in an intimate relationship.
What if your spouse knew you so well that they could anticipate your behavior in any circumstance, and thereby manipulate you without your realizing it?

Gillian Flynn takes the common marital concerns about money, in-laws, and parenthood, and turns them into toxic waste in the case of Nick and Amy Dunne. Amy is revealed through her diaries, and Nick narrates his experiences as he follows the clues in the anniversary treasure hunt laid out by his wife before she disappeared. Did Nick kill Amy? A lot of people think so, but her body hasn't been found. Is Amy still alive? What was lurking beneath the surface of their marriage?

GONE GIRL is a thriller, but it's a slow burn. Flynn strings you along. She doles out just enough information to make you think you've figured things out before she hits you with another "GOTCHA!" revelation that changes everything. And she saves the biggest gotcha of all for the end, which is shocking in its subtlety. The way the story ends puts the final seal on what a truly sick relationship Nick and Amy had.
The path is twisted, disturbing, and sometimes horrifying. It's also irresistible.
Sensitive readers should proceed with caution. The book does contain coarse language as well as some violence and sexual content.
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670 of 768 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars When a Perfect Marriage Turns Sour June 6, 2012
Format:Hardcover
A beautiful woman is snared by a young man who can't believe his good fortune. She is well off and adores him. What can be better? Both are writers living in New York but they lose their jobs. In addition, the woman's parents become financially bereft and ask their daughter to borrow her money. Poor, they use the last of her money to buy a bar in his hometown which is run by her husband and his twin sister.

Amy Elliott Dunne has another side to her personality that Nick Dunne is about to discover as the ideal marriage that he thought he had begins to fall apart. When Amy disappears Nick is believed to be the cause of her disappearance.

Did he murder his beloved wife? Nick knows he didn't but all signs point to that conclusion. The police believe he is responsible for her absence. Her parents, who stand by him in the beginning, arrive at the same belief. The public and the media are likewise convinced. He wonders if even his twin sister believes it as well. Before the reader discovers the truth, the reader becomes wrapped up in endless detail.

This is a thriller that does keep one turning the pages but it roars to a pallid conclusion. I liked it but thought that someone should have spent more time editing as details are presented again and again. I know many others will like this read but I was disappointed.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars Bone chilling and impossible to put down
Wow. What a book! Read it in one sitting, when I probably should have been sleeping. Best thriller I've read in years.
Published 7 minutes ago by Helena Thompson
5.0 out of 5 stars Great
Every time I thought I had it figured out I didn't. Great thriller. I don't know anyone who hasn't read it by now so if you haven't, you must!
Published 1 hour ago by sodano
2.0 out of 5 stars Wasn't good...
Sharp Objects was really good and then there is this book. The suspense was minimal and I hated both of the characters throughout the entire book. And it ended terribly!
Published 2 hours ago by LJD
5.0 out of 5 stars Surprising!
Just when you think you know what's happening, you find out that you don't! I read it on recommendation, but did not realize what I was getting into. Read more
Published 4 hours ago by J. Brown
4.0 out of 5 stars Suspenseful, thrilling, edge-of your seat read.
I enjoyed the back and forth, he-said, she-said. It kept me wondering who's version was the the truth. Read more
Published 5 hours ago by CCAhlers
3.0 out of 5 stars Well-written but a little over the top
Gillian Flynn is a great writer, and I looked forward to reading this book, but I liked Dark Places better Dark Places: A Novel. Read more
Published 5 hours ago by RT
4.0 out of 5 stars Crazy story
A complicated story that just kept on getting more compicated.The characters kept me interested and the ending was a little strange.
Published 5 hours ago by Margaret Brown
5.0 out of 5 stars Great writing!
It was impossible to second-guess the twists in this book! I loved the writing, which is as important to me as a good plot. :)
Published 16 hours ago by poodlesgirl
4.0 out of 5 stars Wildest, strangest read this year
This book pretty much blew my mind. I read it in actual hard cover. It was interesting in that I really did not like the characters, yet I found the story wildly entertaining. Read more
Published 18 hours ago by NorCal Mom
4.0 out of 5 stars Really kept my attention!
At first the story started out kind of slow, but the twists that start happening really keep you reading to find out what's next. Read more
Published 20 hours ago by MJKate
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Topic From this Discussion
Alternate endings? SPOILER ALERT
I was hoping Amy would get caught and everyone would know she was psycho. I didn't like either character. I am disappointed with the ending, after all of the drawn out story, that'ts it?
Aug 2, 2012 by M |  See all 75 posts
What About the Car?
I was willing to overlook the details about the car paperwork, but how about buying over $100,000 worth of stuff over the internet and the police not being able to track down the emails, delivery addresses and other electronic evidence. Also, from the description of the dilapidated shed,... Read more
Mar 7, 2013 by SaintGenevieve |  See all 5 posts
SPOILER ALERT!!!!! How is Nick as bad as Amy?
From Nick's perspective, he is pretty normal. Everyone else describes him as shockingly callow and detached. He's possibly a psychopath. Charming, but coldhearted, incredibly self-centered, lacking in empathy. Talented at manipulation. Like Amy, it takes a bit of thinking on his part to figure... Read more
Sep 2, 2012 by E. Weiland |  See all 26 posts
Who should star in 'Gone Girl' the movie?
Reese would be great as Amy, but Charlize Theron might pull off the second half even better (based on her performance in "Monster").

For Nick, my money's on Jake Gyllenhaal--especially opposite Reese. There's got to be some weird energy there they could use.

My biggest question about... Read more
Jul 27, 2012 by Mari Malcolm |  See all 109 posts
Gone Girl Be the first to reply
the gone girl hate club
I really did not like this book either. Mostly because it was so implausible. Amy would have made more mistakes, Nick would not have been so ineffectual.
His conversion was 98% unbelievable.
I ended up sorry that I read this book.
PS: Didn't you mean "drivel" ... Read more
Dec 11, 2012 by Wallaby |  See all 25 posts
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