Lies.

What are the lies we tell ourselves? What are the lies we tell others? Which ones are we aware of, and which ones don’t we know about until it’s too late?

This book kept me at the edge of my seat–and it’s rare that I can’t figure out the drift of a story pretty early on. The story twists and turns in ways that are sometimes expected, and sometimes not at all.

Any reader of mysteries, thrillers or even general fiction will find her interest piqued.

Nick is married to beautiful and wealthy Amy, heir to a series of childhood books named after her. After they both lose their New York jobs, they move to Nick’s childhood town along the Mississippi river. And the day of their 5th anniversary, Amy disappears.

Where is she? Is she still even alive? As the police’s suspicion falls more and more on Nick, and the evidence starts piling against him, he needs to prove that he is innocent. But how do you prove the unprovable?

I could feel her girl-brain buzzing, turning Amy’s disappearance into a frothy, scandalous romance, ignoring any reality that didn’t suit the narrative.

Gone Girl is a story of broken love, and the lies that keep it together despite the anger, the resentment and the desire for vengeance. It’s a story of the consequences of financial and emotional dependence and manipulation. It tells us a (rather bleak) tale of the lengths some people are willing to go to get revenge, and of what people are willing to accept in order to maintain appearances. Because in this book, appearances are everything. Can someonebe a killer simply because he looks like one? Is there anything beyond the plastic surface we present to the media, the idealized version of ourselves we present to others?

In other words, are we ever anything more than skin-deep?

“You’d literally lie, cheat, and steal — hell, kill — to convince people that you are a good guy,” Go once said. … I lost my appetite because it was so completely true and I’d never realized it, and even as she was saying it, I thought: I will never forget this, this is one of those moments that will be lodged in my brain forever.

It’s interesting that both main characters are writers–they know how to play with words and how to use them to their advantage. In this book, words are slimy and slippery. The foundation of language that we have been taught to trust can lead you astray or even collapse right under your feet. They built their life through words, and when these words no longer serve them, their whole life falls apart. And they try to rebuilt it through words, again, but the building is only a shadow of its original, a mere façade that hides the emptiness inside.

Gillian Flynn wrote a rare masterful novel, one that went, I think, far beyond the simple thriller story. It was not only entertaining, but also deep and thoughtful. There’s no easy way out of the book, and it will leave you shaking and reflecting for a while… is the person you love really who he or she says she is? Are you the person you think you are?