Amazing Amy

Gone Girl
Spoilers, obviously.  Your enjoyment of the book (or upcoming movie) will be significantly lessened  if you continue to read.

Gone Girl has a problem.  The protagonist is not likeable.  That is not necessarily a problem for me, but I could understand others finding little to care about.  The mystery propels the story along, as Flynn (Amy) sets up Nick for the fall.  At one point I wondered when Nick would kill a puppy, because that is about the only thing he does not do.  Lying, cheating, physical abuse...it is all there in the prototype for a bad husband.

At about the halfway point the story takes a turn.  There is also a reversal in characterization.  I suspect that Flynn wrote the beginning and end of the novel first, then tried to construct a middle to fit.  We are told how meticulous Amy is, but then as soon as we are introduced to "real time" Amy, she turns stupid.  All she has to do is hide out for a few weeks, appearing in public as little as possible.  Instead she decides to lay out by the pool each day and try to make new friends.  Odd.  Then she changes her mind and decides not to kill herself, in the process abandoning a plan that was over a year in the making. 

One of the misdirects in the first half of the book involves the idea that Amy could not have been involved in her own disappearance due to 1. no missing money and 2. the blood in the kitchen.  Amy later explains that she was able to quietly accumulate ten thousand dollars by withdrawing small sums.  Ok, but ten thousand is not very much to live on for very long, especially without any form of identification.  The planned suicide explained this, but it reads more like Flynn could not come up with a better way to explain this difficulty.  It is hard to believe that someone as egotistical and resourceful as Amy would kill herself.

We are never told how Amy planned to make money.  Is it possible that she always had Desi in the back of her mind?  Maybe.  But we are let into Amy's mind, and Desi is never mentioned until after the robbery.  Speaking of the robbery, this is another slip-up by Amy.  It is almost as if she is trying  to blow her cover.  She knew that Greta has seen her cash.  Right then and there she should have fled.  Instead she hangs around, indicating that the "real" Amy is a trusting soul--or incredibly naive.  This whole in-congruent stretch contains "stupid" Amy, and it was at this point that I began to wonder if I could finish the book.  Things change.  After the casino, no more stupid Amy.

As the story was reaching its conclusion, I became concerned that it would not end the "right" way.  By saying "right" I am not referring to good triumphing over evil.  I just want a logical conclusion.  Flynn's ending is perfect in that regard.


Flynn is not the first person to reveal a mentally unstable character who this the child of two psychologists.  This was also a prominent plot line in Six Feet Under.