Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn (Crown; $25)

I finally got around to reading Gillian Flynn’s third mystery and boy, was it worth the wait! I had loved Sharp Objects, her first book, but had lost track of her. A friend recommended Gone Girl, and it was terrific. Full of huge, unexpected twists and turns, red herrings, and “OMG” moments.

Nick and Amy Dunne have it all. Both are beautiful, living the New York City glam life. The two magazine writers supplement their incomes with a trust fund set up by Amy’s parents, the authors of the “Amazing Amy” series of children’s books.  

But in a head-spinning turn of events, it’s over. Both are laid off, the trust fund is gone, and they lose the Brooklyn brownstone. When Nick’s twin sister calls from the Dunne family home in North Carthage, Missouri, to say that Nick’s mother is dying, he decides that he and Amy must move back to his family homet. They rent a foreclosed McMansion in a ghost town of similar properties and try to make a new life.  Using the last of Amy’s money, Nick and his sister open a bar.

On the afternoon of Amy and Nick’s fifth wedding anniversary, Nick gets a call at the bar from a neighbor, saying that his cat is outside, and his front door is wide open. Nick returns home to find signs of a struggle and Amy gone.

Model-handsome Nick has been anything but a model husband. He doesn’t help himself by lying to the cops.  The reader knows it’s just a matter of time before the cops learn what we know and put him away.

Until. . .

Sorry. I can’t tell more without giving away the best moments of a terrific story.

With such an outstanding plot, it seems somewhat petty to say that I hated how the book ended. Flynn pulled back at the last minute, with an ending that came across as surprisingly cowardly. I’d love to know why she lost her nerve. 

As soon as I have time, I'm going back to read Dark Places. 

The Start of Everything, by Emily Winslow (Delacorte Press; $26.00)

When the body of a young woman washes up in a flooded marsh outside of Cambridge, England, Detective Inspector Chloe Frohmann and her partner, Morris Keene—just back from medical leave after being knifed in the gut and hand—must first figure out who she is, before they can try to solve the question of who killed her.

Meanwhile, a number of letters addressed only to Katja, in care of the university, arrive in the mailroom, where Mathilde Oliver has the job of sending misdirected mail to the proper recipient. Mattie, whose father is an astronomy professor at the university, has some pretty major issues. She reads the letters and learns that someone named Stephen is pining for this Katja. Problem is, there doesn’t seem to be anyone at the university with that name.

Could it be that Katja is the young woman in the swamp? Well, maybe. The parallel plot lines would certainly lead one to that conclusion. But that would be too easy. Instead, Emily Winslow, an American living in Cambridge, muddies the plot with people sharing the same name; a pivotal character who gets two other pivotal characters confused and calls them by the wrong names; confusing switches between the past and present: and finally, the lamest plot device of all time: an evil twin who doesn’t surface until near the end of the book.

It’s a shame Emily Winslow’s plot wasn’t up to her setting. Cambridge shouldn’t be wasted on such drivel.  This book was a sloppy mess.