This week/weekend I read one of the best “edge of your seat” books I’ve read in a long time!! Gillian Flynn is a thriller/mystery writer who has also written Gone Girl & Sharp Objects. Gone Girl was AMAZING! So, I immediately bought the other two. That was 4 months ago.
After I finally finished Son of Neptune by Rick Riordan (young adult novel & 2nd book in the Heroes of Olympus series) on Saturday, I was ready for a new book! An adult book. I was hooked on the first page of Dark Places! The plot is intense & dark…hence the title:) What I love about the way it is written is how the chapters alternate between characters…Libby Day the protagonist, Patty Day her mom, & Ben Day her brother. I LOVE when writers o this! It gives you such a whole perspective of a story. Flynn also did this in Gone Girl, alternating between Amy & her husband. Gillian Flynn is phenomenal.
At the age of seven, Libby “witnesses” the murder of her 2 sisters & mother in their Kansas farmhouse. Libby testifies against her older brother Ben. Libby’s chapters are set in the present time & told through the first person point of view. Ben & Patty’s chapters take you through what actually happened on that January day in 1985 (83? I lent the book to a friend today & can’t remember the exact year:).
This book had me hanging on to every single word & something important was always happening! I don’t want to write too much because I want to encourage others to read it! This book & author is a must-read! I started this book on Saturday & finished the last 40 pages last night. After finishing grad school in December, it’s taken me awhile to be that enthralled by a book. It is an amazing feeling & reminds me why I love books so much! Gillian Flynn is very astute in the way she writes, but not in a way where she throws around fancy vocabulary, but she says profound things in a simple way.
She developed the character Libby in a way that although she was a victim; she kind of pissed me off how lazy she was & unmotivated. At the same time, I liked her a lot! I liked how she could connect with unexpected secondary characters, yet critique other less pleasant characters in such a funny way! One of my favorite lines:
(In response to Magda having egg in her hair…at 12:30am)
“Is that from this morning or did she just have them? Who eats eggs at midnight?”
Lol!! Libby had a very dry sense of humor & an I-don’t-give-what attitude.
If you have not read this book—-READ IT!! And then tell me what you think :). If you have…
What did you think???
