Book #148 – Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn

Since I’ve already read Gone Girl as part of the Great American Read, and Tom Sawyer as part of my classic literature challenge, there weren’t many books left set in Missouri. I was tempted to read Gillian Flynn’s other novel, Dark Places, which has settings in Kansas City, but given the recent Super Bowl win and my sister living there, I didn’t want to tarnish my idea of the place with how twisted Flynn makes her characters. So, I instead went to the “boot heel” of the state with Flynn’s Sharp Objects. So, sorry, little-sis, I’m still terrified by your new state.

Sharp Objects was Gillian Flynn’s first published novel in 2006, during her career as a television critic for Entertainment Weekly. This debut novel has been met with praise, and while it may not have reached the fame of Gone Girl, it was the winner of the Ian Fleming Steel Dagger from the Crime Writer’s Association in 2007. This award is given to a thriller where one “just has to turn the next page”. The book also received a recent miniseries adaptation on HBO in 2018, with Amy Adams starring as Camille and Patricia Clarkson as Adora Crellin.

As I said, the book is set in the boot heel of Missouri, which I think puts it somewhere near Gobler or Senath, but given the various times the woods are mentioned, I’m thinking it might be based on Hornersville, since Wind Gap doesn’t actually exist. However, in an interview discussing the book, Flynn admits that she didn’t have a singular location in mind, simply a “small hometown type place” in the area of Missouri that may still think itself southern. Actual town notwithstanding, the description of the town, or rather the strange places in the town, will probably haunt me for weeks. Flynn does a fantastic job ramping up the creepy factor by showcasing the main family’s pig farm, the abandoned places in the woods, and the old manor house where Camille’s mother and half sister live. However, if I did start to get tired of all the blondes after a while, but at least the various shades, textures, length, etc was well documented. Possibly the best detail is Amma’s dollhouse, as it perfectly allows for description of Adora’s house as well.

Much like Gillian Flynn’s other novel I’ve read, I generally loathed 90% of the characters I met. I think the only one I actually liked is Curry, the editor, and maybe Bob Nash, the father of one of the victims. Everyone else sort of ramps up the broken-human-being trope to eleven, which gives for a really interesting thriller, but makes actually liking any of them by the end of the book nearly impossible for me. For example, Camille starts of as a sympathetic journalist with deep-rooted issues with her mother due to the death of her sister, Marion, when she was young. These issues have lead to her cutting dozens of words into her own flesh that appear random, but may have links to her rather rocky adolescence. Again, she’s meant to be sympathetic, and I probably would have liked her had she actually stayed above the influence of the town and not done drugs with a bunch of teenagers to relive her glory years or slept with an equally messed up character just to get a better angle for her story. And she’s probably the most sympathetic of any of the female cast. The story basically ramps up the “a pretty face hides a monster” theme that Dorian Gray was apt to tell.

Speaking of the story and the themes that build the plot, the book falls into the murder mystery category, but it doesn’t do that great of a job at hiding the mystery aspect. The foreshadowing of the identity of the murderer is laid on super thick as soon as Camille meets them. I think the only part I hadn’t pieced together by the grand reveal was what had become of the missing teeth. I would say its more of a psychological thriller, as each new aspect about one character or another made me want to keep reading just to see how deep the rabbit hole of insanity went. As I stated earlier, a lot of the pretty outside of the people in the town reveals a twisted or broken inside, and through the premise of Camille trying to get a lead for her story, a lot of cracks in the town’s structure are revealed. While the whole of the novel is a tad melodramatic, I rather enjoyed the layering of the town’s secrets.

Overall, I liked this book. If you’re looking for a creepy psychological thriller that makes you want to find out if your suspicions are correct, this is certainly a good novel for a weekend read.

“Problems always start long before you really, really see them.” – Gillian Flynn

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