Bookish Thoughts

When Gone Girl  came out, there was a ton of buzz around it, most centered on the shocking twist. It was like The Sixth Sense  all over again, with everyone swearing you had to read it but refusing to tell you anything about it. Sometimes stories can rely on these twists to much, making that the only worthwhile thing about them. And they end up falling apart once you know the secret. But Gone Girl  holds up incredibly well. Even knowing what Amy's plotting from the beginning, it remains gripping and thrilling. Gillian Flynn populates the novel with some truly horrible, selfish, twisted people, and it's so much fun to watch them play games with each other and see how Amy comes out on top of everyone. It helps that she's the most ruthless and least moral. She'll literally do whatever it takes to get what she wants, including killing a (mostly) innocent guy. (Seriously, though, Desi was just as bad as the rest of them.) I really enjoyed my re-read of this book. Knowing...

I really like Gillian Flynn's books. They're twisty and turny and they don't shy away from the darker aspects of human nature, making for some great psychological thrillers. But I am glad that they tend to be shorter and that she's not all that prolific. Because these books can be hard to read. Reading about horrible people doing horrible things and all the damage they leave in their wake is emotionally draining. But it's so interesting that I can't stop. Sharp Objects is actually Flynn's first book, meaning I've worked my way through her books in reverse. But it's just as dark and compelling as her other books, at least in my opinion. The narrator is a journalist who was abused by her mother and driven to self harm. Fresh out of a stint in a psychiatric hospital, she's sent back to her hometown to report on the disappearances and subsequent murders of two local girls. Which would be bad enough even if she weren't staying in her mother...

Ever since I read Gone Girl , I've been wanting to read the rest of Gillian Flynn's work. She's amazing at creating dark, creepy scenarios that keep you guessing. It's not the sort of thing I want to read all the time. But every now and then they're a lot of fun, a nice break from what I usually read. This one follows Libby Day decades after the massacre of her family when she was seven years old. At the time she testified against her brother, who has been in jail ever since. But new evidence suggests that he may have been innocent, and Libby is finally convinced to begin investigating and coming to terms with the discrepancies between her own memories and what she was subtly coached to say. The narrative flips back and forth between Libby's quest in the present and the actions of her mother and brother on the day of the murder. The structure kept the tension high as it seemed to reveal and then deny both motive and opportunity for various characters. And th...

Holy shit. This book is the perfect example of how (and maybe why) I tend to be so behind the times in the book world. It came out three years ago, and there was a ton of hype. Everyone was talking about it. They read it in on sitting! The twist was so incredible! No one saw it coming and no one could put it down. I was skeptical (I had somewhat recently been burned by the Twilight hype). I found out what that twist was (Amy did it!) and decided I didn't want to read it. My mother-in-law even lent it to me and it sat on the side table for months while I studiously ignored it, refusing to be pulled into the hype. And then it got turned into a movie so the hype continued. But then an interesting thing happened. I continued to see people talking about  Gone Girl . About Gillian Flynn's other books. I read one of her short stories and was intrigued. It seemed like there might be something more here than an unexpected twist midway through the book. So when I saw it at the used...

I'll admit, I bought this $30, 800+ page tome in order to read one single short story. Because that short story was written by Patrick Rothfuss about Bast, and I am desperate for new material in that world. Of course, this collection also contains plenty of other stories by plenty of other authors I love, so it felt worth that price tag. Let's go through it story by story, shall we? The Lightning Tree  by Patrick Rothfuss - This story basically chronicles a day in the life of Bast an indeterminate amount of time before the first book starts, but after Kvothe has established himself as Kote, owner of the Waystone Inn. Bast trades secrets and favors with children, gets into some mischief, does some highly questionable and uncomfortable things, but also does some tough and honorable things. He's a tough guy to pin down, because his moral code is skewed by his Fae heritage. This story left me more confused about him than before, but it was a nice little slice of life, none...