What’s it all about?:
Fresh from a brief stay at a psych hospital, reporter Camille Preaker faces a troubling assignment: she must return to her tiny hometown to cover the murders of two preteen girls. For years, Camille has hardly spoken to her neurotic, hypochondriac mother or to the half-sister she barely knows, a beautiful thirteen-year-old with an eerie grip on the town. Now, installed in her old bedroom in her family’s Victorian mansion, Camille finds herself identifying with the young victims—a bit too strongly. Dogged by her own demons, she must unravel the psychological puzzle of her own past if she wants to get the story—and survive this homecoming.
What did I think?:
Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past five years or so, you cannot have failed to witness the phenomenon that was Gillian Flynn’s third novel, Gone Girl. When I read it, I was completely blown away, particularly with all the intricate twists and turns that made the narrative so blinking exciting to read. I finished it determined to explore the rest of the author’s back catalogue, to satisfy my impatience in waiting for her to write something else, like RIGHT NOW. Sharp Objects was actually her debut novel and I thought, a great place to start. Luckily, I wasn’t disappointed. It didn’t have the “ka-pow” of Gone Girl unfortunately (perhaps I had unrealistic expectations anyway) but it was still a rollicking good read and incredibly dark, definitely not one for those of you sensitive and triggered by certain issues i.e. self harm.
Most of the characters in this novel are disturbed, damaged or broken in some way, shape or form including our main female protagonist, Camille Preaker who returns to her home town as a reporter investigating the murder of two young girls. However, in attempting to unravel the mystery surrounding the tragic deaths, she becomes embroiled in confronting her own demons. This includes trying to repair a fragile relationship with a distant mother and endeavouring to forge some kind of connection with her thirteen year old half sister, Amma. Camille finds out very quickly that her past trials and tribulations are still very much a part of her present and that the toughest and most frightening test of her life may be still to come.
This is another one of those novels that you really can’t say too much about the plot for fear of ruining everything so I’m going to stop there. I will just say that even though I was familiar with Gillian Flynn’s style of story-telling, I was still woefully unprepared for the twisty darkness that lies within this novel. Every single character here has a murky past, is troubled in some way and a lot of the times, is entirely unreliable. Yet this is what made it such a fascinating read, even if I had to muffle exclamations of horror at some points! Personally, I particularly love to hate an unlikeable character and there are plenty of them in this novel to shake your head at, get frustrated and perhaps in some cases, feel a little frightened of. Even Camille herself is far from perfect and had me screaming at her internally quite a few times with the decisions that she made. No, it’s not Gone Girl, that’s true so if you’re expecting that you might be a bit disappointed. However, if you’re in the mood for something deliciously sinister and raw, this should be right up your street.
Would I recommend it?:
But of course!
Star rating (out of 5):
