Sharp Objects

I'm not an avid reader by any stretch of the imagination. To capture my attention a book really needs to be off the charts amazing. I was talked into reading Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn and loved it. Once my wife bought Sharp Objects I decided to give it a try too. Sure enough, I found myself engrossed in it so much that I had completed it in just a few days. (Having a newborn helped as it kept me seating with a baby sleeping on me a lot. So reading was a nice quiet activity to pass the time with.) The thing about Gillian Flynn's writing that stands out is the depth she gives to her characters. There aren't one dimensional characters in her books. If a character is worth including in her stories the character is worth developing and giving some zest to. She is also amazing at writing 'crazy' AND making crazy be entertaining rather than sad or uncomfortable. That's no easy task. Camillie from Sharp Objects isn't the same kind of crazy as Amy from Gone Girl. That says a lot about Flynn's writing chops. If a writer has personal history with 1 kind of 'crazy' then it's not too hard to write it. But to be able to write completely different kinds of 'crazy' shows a remarkable ability for a writer to leave herself and get into the mind of a fictional character. Where Amy from Gone Girl was sociopathicly psychotic, Camille from Sharp Objects possibly deals with borderline personality disorder manifesting itself as self harm. However, both characters have a common cause of their issues, both being from really messed up families. But again, Flynn doesn't play the same cards over and over. Where the family background of Amy in Gone Girl was friendly and outwardly loving while inwardly being one gigantic ball of disappointment as her parents loved their fictional daughter more than their real one....Camille from Sharp Objects comes with a violent and abusive family. So not only can Flynn write different kinds of 'crazy'. She can write different causes for 'crazy', and most importantly have those causes result in mental disorders than you'd expect the backgrounds to trigger. (Amy from Gone Girl wouldn't likely develop bi-polar tendencies as the result of her upbringing. Camille from Sharp Object's whack job family could easily induce that kind of psychological result. And vice versa.) Basically Flynn understands abnormal psychology and writes it very VERY well. Simple as that. Her plot lines are a little unrealistic, but so what? It's a story. If it was hyper realistic it'd be no fun. You can enjoy an unrealistic plot if your characters are completely believable.

NO SPOILERS IN THIS REVIEW: Really nice first novel from this author, with a very defined 3-act structure. This one is written entirely in first-person, from only the main character's point of view. Act 1 sets the stage, but feels a bit disconnected. I would say Act 2 doesn't really begin until around page 50, when a big plot point is revealed. Prior to page 50 I found myself wondering "where is this going?" and after page 50, a few random facts in the novel get explained and then it really starts to come together. After that, it is a smooth ride downhill: a fast, engrossing read. So much so that you might find yourself ignoring your family members just to get to the end of this book. A girlfriend of mine is about to go on tour, and I had to finish reading this so I could lend it to her before she left. Once you read a good book, you need someone else to experience it with you, right? Act 2 lasts for nearly the rest of the book until the last 20 pages or so, when Gillian Flynn surprises us again. Of course, if she gave you the ending you expected, it wouldn't be a good book, right? I will note that the ending is rather hastily wrapped up, and for me at least, my feelings about the characters don't really blossom as the could have with a more robust ending. I will say that she likely received this feedback from readers and learned from it, because all these "complaints" are corrected prior to her novel "Gone Girl." Gone Girl is like the older, rarer vintage of a really nice wine. All in all, even Stephen King praised Sharp Objects as an excellent first effort, and it's a book worthy of your attention whether you're already a Gillian Flynn fan, or you just like suspenseful, thrilling novels. Once you've picked this one up, move on to "Gone Girl" and don't see the movie until you've read the book!

This book is a lot. It draws many gruesome pictures. I could live without the details of the family business. I found it a little predictable, but still some things came as a shock. Overall, good read.

This is an older book but it’s new to me; it’s this psychological thriller about this reporter who gets assigned to write about the recent disappearances and deaths of young girls in her hometown. It’s a quick paced read and the plot has tons of disturbing clues as to whom the killer is. From the jump you realize our protagonist has an estranged relationship with her mom/hometown and the more we learn the more we realize these girls are messed up. While I wasn’t grasping at the edge of each page I did enjoy the book so overall I’d say it was ok. Psychological thriller Easy to read/quick paced Mentally disturbed females

I read the three Gillian Flynn novels backwards to the order they were written, starting with Gone Girl and ending with Sharp Objects. All the books are truly enjoyable yet disturbing reads. Sharp Objects, of the three, may be my favorite. The story has an abstract quality that may lack realism, but is moving and almost poetic compared to her other novels. The twists and turns of the novel are fairly predictable, but still engaging. Camille, the main character, is a complex but ultimately decent human being. I think this innate decency in a central character served well to make such a dark story more palatable. The remainder of the characters are pretty much one-note, WYSIWYG types, with the exception of maybe one of the male characters who actually has a fairly minor role overall. We see all the characters through Camille's eyes and how she interprets them lends insight into her own character. I don't want to spoil too much, part of the book's enjoyment is seeing how the events unfold and trying to guess what is going on. I give it 4 instead of 5 stars because of a few minor quibbles. Too much coincidental occurrences (the reporter from Wind-Gap gets sent to Wind-Gap and finds the killer in a very, ahem, convenient place.) Unexplained issues - like it is sticky-hot at the time and place of the novel, but no one comments on Camille wearing what must have been long-sleeves, high necked shirts, and pants? And a little sloppy writing (the extremely concerned and protective editor sends his reporter back home to cover a story when he knows she has severe psychological trauma, probably stemming from her time growing up at that home). Anyway, I highly recommend this book to any fans of Gillian Flynn's or fans of this genre of fiction.

I could not stop reading this! Stayed up way too late many nights because this book just pulled me in and I couldn’t stop reading.

Wonderful, Suspenseful Roller Coaster Ride!!!! This book is amazing. As we all know, Gillian Flynn is quite a writer! This is the 2'nd book by her I've read. Both books I knew right from the first two pages I was in for a treat from a very talented writer. What I love best about Flynn is that she isn't afraid to go "raunchy".. Her main and most lovable characters often talk about the "taboo" things they did as a teenager like masturbating or experimenting with drugs. There are certain places writers don't want to go, not even for a few sentences for fear of losing a certain audience but Flynn dives right in. Even in the darkest of scenes she may add a certain sentence that will make you laugh out loud suddenly. Also she hints at certain "red flags" about certain characters that makes that tiny voice in the back of your head say "Wait a minute, I'm not sure what to think about this character just yet---".... Then by the end of the chapter, that very character might be winning your sympathy or affections and then you are battling with in your own mind on what to think! Thank you Gillian Flynn for making me feel a little "crazy" at times, a little "less crazy" at others and completely satisfied and fulfilled by the end of the book! **************************************************************************************************** About the book: “In Niki’s Own Words” It follows the story of a young reporter who has long ago left home and only returned once. When terror strikes her home town, she is forced to be the “girl with the In” and return home to catch the “big story” and “make it big” for her small Chicago Paper. What she doesn’t realize is that by returning home, she may be a little more involved in the very crimes she is reporting than she even knows, even before she gets home! Upon returning home she must face her own personal demons that were long left behind and most already forgotten. Degraded and ready to give up, Camille must battle the greatest fight for her life while fulfilling her bosses dreams and high expectations — Is the challenge too much for Camille? Will she let down everyone depending on her, her own self or all of the above??

Camille is a messed up character. I’m gonna be honest, I totally watched the HBO remake before reading the book so I had expectations, I expected a gothic murder mystery. What I got was a incredibly flawed broken character that was too damaged for relatability. With the cutting, sexual trauma, and her need for intimacy so tied to parental love that it was off putting - I get the desire of children who never experienced love to what to replace their parents, but this takes it to a whole new level. You reading this book and you realize that this person is mentally coming of a child without any real understanding of what adult relationships should be or how families should interact with each other and it is really hard to get past the damage that has already been done to truly enjoy the story. Another reviewer commented on the male characters basically being window dressing, presented as one dimension props for the story. Which aside from John, the only male character who acted with any form of agency of his own, that’s something I found to be true. I feel like if your gonna have characters present for the large majority of the story, have the be secondary characters that drive the plot forward, they need to be more the 1 dimensional troupes. Light spoilers about the ending ahead: I feel like the main Camille needed to be less outside of the norm to be relatable, is it common for a child who was never allowed to be one to assign other adults parental roles, sure. But this takes that to the extreme, making it a unsatisfying ending to what is a roller coaster of trauma. It just doesn’t feel like a win or a loss, just more of the same. I wouldn’t say I enjoyed this book, but I am glad I read it. Generally this is outside of my normal horror genre preferences and I really may have come to this book expecting a lot more from Flynn then she had the ability to give. It is something I do with dramas, reading more into them then was what intended. I just see a bunch of different ways this could have been a more put together story, all of them small tweaks that would have left me more satisfied with the resolution then I was. It’s worth the read, I’m not unset I bought it, I just don’t see a re-read happening.

Gillian Flynn marks her territory as a masterful story teller in this, her debut novel. It is at times intense; always thoroughly engaging and constructed to bring each character into sharp focus. Her ability to shape and shift the narrative keeps the reader totally engaged but never allows any level of complacency. She has that innate ability to suddenly, deftly, spring another "gotcha" trap; destroying your self-assured belief that you knew exactly how the story line would unfold. There is nothing disappointing about this novel and I highly recommend you add it to your reading list.

This book is absolutely stunning—one of my all-time favorites!

Mto bom, como os demais livros de Gillian Flynn. Excelente autora, seus livros prendem o leitor até a última página, não só com o desenrolar da história, mas também com seu estilo cheio de fina ironia.

Precies zoals geadverteerd

masterpiece