Marital meltdown
Gillian Flynn’s third novel is a gripping tale of a relationship gone badly wrong
Awife mysteriously disappears. A handsome husband stands to walk away a millionaire if his spouse is six-feet under. Local detectives and the media smell the blood of uxoricide.
Spousal homicide is a recipe for success in the thriller genre as the story unveils the human drama of a rotting marriage amid nail-biting suspense. The success of Gone Girl, the third novel by American writer Gillian Flynn, confirms the marital meltdown thriller has a wider exposure.
The book has become a phenomenal hit. So far, more than two million copies have been sold and Gone Girl has been in the top 10 list of The New York Times for almost a year. And it’s destined for the silver screen; Flynn reportedly struck a deal to write the screenplay with Academy Awardwinning actress Reese Witherspoon as producer, while David Fincher (who helmed The Social Network and The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo), may jump on board as director.
Like all good thriller writers, Flynn deftly stirs characters, plot and clues into a cauldron of vengeance, edgeof-the-seat suspense and love-turnedsour that continually frays readers’ nerves.
The story follows the husband, Nick Dunne, as he searches high and low for his missing wife, Amy, who disappeared on the morning of the fifth anniversary of their wedding. As we follow Nick as he pieces together the clues behind his wife’s disappearance, the couple’s bad romance is gradually revealed.
Spouses doing a disappearing act is not a particularly innovative plot device. Yet Flynn is a sophisticated writer who subtly works in larger issues such as gender identity as well as deftly weaving in character studies without spoiling the fun.
Gone Girl incorporates the issue of class in its own facetious fashion. Coming from a blue-collar family in southern Missouri, Nick was a journalist covering the pop culture beat in the Big Apple. (Flynn was also a pop culture writer at Entertainment Weekly before being laid off after the free digital media boom.)
Amy is the epitome of the uptown girl — an Upper East Side heiress who pens girlish quiz columns for a teen magazine. But she is not just another Manhattan trust fund kid. Known as ‘‘Amazing Amy’’, she has become the perfect role model for American girls. Amy is a semi-public figure in the book’s farcical way.
Her famous parents and psychologists have written books on child-raising based on her character and those of her school friends. (The ‘‘Amazing Amy’’ series has become a staple household guidebook for US parenting!)
Wealthy, intelligent and beautiful, classy Amy has a manipulative streak. Like penning her quiz column in a teen magazine, she also plays mind games with her husband, providing a trail of clues such as poems and dead baby dolls.
One of the things that makes Gone Girl so entertaining is its well crafted narrative structure. The author made the right decision using the conarrator technique, making for a cerebral read that takes us inside the heads of the two main protagonists.
The prose is varied — alternating between chick-lit tones in Amy’s puerile diary, and more measured tones in Nick’s monologues. At times it is girlish, at others, trembling.
But the main emphasis is more than a psychological thriller. Amy’s shifting identity leads us to question what constitutes ideal feminity in the eyes of men, and society in general. After finishing the book, you may wonder whether you know your spouse as well as you thought.
For female readers conjuring up revenge scenarios against their male lovers, or privately wishing to reverse gender roles, Gone Girl is diabolically gripping.
For those seeking intelligent and highly entertaining reading material for a weekend or holiday escapade, Gone Girl is definitely a must-read.