I’ve been to *Dark Places* and back

I was paging through an arts & entertainment magazine when I came across a mention that Amy Adams was set to star in the movie adaptation of a book called Dark Places by Gillian Flynn. It’s a murder-mystery-thriller, with some family drama mixed in. Coverage of the movie-to-be is all over the place – could be a good one. Reading about the movie made me curious about the book. My library had a copy on the shelf, so I grabbed it. Once I started reading, it was really hard to put down. It’s a story about people – a poor family who is struggling to keep a farm. They’re loving but flawed. It’s a reminder that no matter who we are, no matter how good we try to be, we’re human and we make mistakes, we are petty and insecure and jealous creatures.

But that’s also part of what makes us so sympathetic, so relate-able to each other, so cherishable. Maybe it’s easier to love a person who’s flawed because we all are. Don’t we really just want to love ourselves? Maybe the compassion we can show for each other stems from the compassion we hope others will show us.

Or something like that.

The book throws in some murder and mayhem on top of the family drama – it’s horrific, but not gratuitous. I’m not usually a crime-murder-thriller reader – but once in a while, you just need a good creep-out. This definitely did it.

The story follows, Libby Day, whose mother and two sisters were murdered when she was young. She escaped, but hasn’t really gone anywhere beyond that day. Twenty-five years later, and she can’t get her life together to, well, save her life.

A murder-mystery hobbyist group finds her, wanting to hire her to talk about her experiences – she had testified that it was her brother who committed the murders, sending him to jail for life. Since then, everyone who has examined the case is convinced he didn’t do it. Libby agrees to talk to the group, needing the money they’ve promised, and her whole world starts to tilt – she ends up running for her life a second time.

The book is a quick read, it pulls you along for a bit of a wild ride – getting more so as it progresses to the end. It wraps up kind of unbelievably, but not enough to ruin the story.

This was a nice little break in between stories of Paris – before this book, I read The Paris Wife… and coming up is Hemingway’s A Moveable Feast. Sometimes you just gotta mix it up… C’est la vie.