The Love, Actually of dark mystery novels.
Gillian Flynn’s debut novel, Dark Objects, follows protagonist Libby Day as she tries to find her family’s murderer. During the Satanic Panic of the 1980s (which I discussed with extreme incredulity in my Unmask Alice post), Libby’s mother and two sisters are murdered in their farmhouse in the early morning hours. Seven-year-old Libby and her “odd” fifteen-year-old brother, Ben, are the only survivors.
The novel begins with present-day Libby, who is living off of dwindling funds that were raised for her after her family’s death nearly twenty years ago. She is suffering from severe depression, and she has to find a way to start making money that doesn’t include a 9-5 office job that would make her even more depressed.
Fortunately, a solution finds her. A group of true crime enthusiasts ask Libby to revisit the murder of her family because they believe her brother Ben, who was convicted of the killings, is actually innocent. Each of these people has their own theory, and they’re often very insensitive to Libby herself, which I think is a nice commentary from Flynn on the true crime genre.
Some of these people adore Libby and seem to idolize her, while others think she (at seven-years-old, mind you) should have done more to find her family’s real killer. As a fan of true crime myself, I try to keep in mind that these aren’t fictional stories, but the stories of real people and real lives. Some of the groupies in Flynn’s novel seem to try to do this as well, but anyone who is so much of a fanatic that they’re actually buying true crime paraphernalia has to be a little off, in my opinion, which is how Flynn generally depicts them.
Naturally (because, once again, this is during the Satanic Panic of the 80s), it’s assumed that Libby’s older brother, odd fifteen-year-old Ben, is the killer. He has recently dyed his hair from red to black, he listens to heavy metal, and he’s a bit of a loner at school. Not to mention, he has started hanging out with some high school burnouts who may or may not actually be worshipping Satan. It’s a recipe for disaster.
One thing Flynn does exceptionally well in her writing is characterization, and having recently watched the Paradise Lost documentary about the West Memphis Three myself, I can say that she characterizes Ben and his situation incredibly well.
Similar to the real-life case, the police immediately focus on Ben and hardly question or even consider any other suspects. Ben himself is truly a bit strange and does have some odd tendencies, but nothing that would really make him seem like a ritualistic killer. A lot of the teenagers who suffered during the Satanic Panic were into things that weren’t considered “mainstream” at the time, and they were alienated for this. Flynn really nailed the “slightly-off-center” markers that attributed to Ben’s alienation.
Not only are there specific explanations for his hair and clothing choices that are not tied to devil worship, she paints his odd personality traits really similarly to many of the boys who were wrongly accused of devil worship during the Satanic Panic. She clearly researched the topic well.
But, of course, the police zero in on these differences and use them to build a case of Satanic ritual sacrifice.
We receive this information through flashbacks of the night of the murders. These flashbacks are told through Ben’s eyes and Patty Day’s (their mother) eyes. The flashbacks serve to show how everything culminated into this tragic event. Similarly to how all the different stories in Love, Actually finally reach the climax at the school play, these flashbacks from different perspectives show different storylines that all come together on the fateful night.
Juxtaposed with the flashback scenes, Libby in the present day is speaking with people from her past, trying to figure out if Ben really is the killer, or if it’s someone else who was overlooked. The true crime groupies are paying her to investigate, which is her initial motivation for reopening these old wounds, but she soon realizes she actually does want to know the truth.
The different storylines playout until eventually we finally figure out how it all fits together, who the real killer is, and what everyone actually did in the aftermath of the murders.
I think the overall story is really interesting, and I would read any of Flynn’s work just because I think she gives so much insight into her characters, and I really enjoy reading novels like that. Aside from the excellent characterization, the plot is kept pretty tight as well.
While I really enjoyed this novel, I would say this book does require more suspension of disbelief than Flynn’s other novels. It’s not necessarily a convoluted plot, but it is highly, highly unlikely that events would have culminated in the way they did. Gone Girl has a similar “everything works out too coincidentally” plot, until you realize that Amy is an extremely intelligent, psychopathic murderer who orchestrated it all. If you believe that she’s one of the most twisted and intelligent murders out there, and that the small town sheriff’s office doesn’t have the resources to deal with her, then it’s pretty believable for her to get away with the crime.
In Dark Objects, the events are all happenstance rather than meticulously orchestrated. The fact that everything leads up to this one fateful night is purely coincidental, which makes it a little harder to believe, in my opinion. Without giving too much away, for everyone to be at the Day’s farmhouse that night at the exact time they were there, and for things to unfold in the precise way they needed to so that all the events overlap just exactly the right way for this specific outcome to happen is just a little, little bit hokey.
If you can get past that, which I certainly can, it’s a really enjoyable book otherwise. I think the ending is sufficiently satisfactory. I didn’t guess the true murderer, but I also think there was enough information that I could possibly have guessed it, so it wasn’t some kind of terrible twist ending.
Having read all three of Flynn’s books now, I would rank them as:
- Sharp Objects
- Gone Girl
- Dark Places
But, I would say they’re all worth reading. If you liked one, you’ll probably like the rest, because I think Flynn’s writing style and signature characterization is heavily present in all of the books. This makes them enjoyable regardless of if you fully believe in the plot or not.
I think Dark Places is a really unique thriller/horror novel that follows an intriguing murder mystery, while also giving a surprising amount of insight into both the Satanic Panic and the true crime community during the 80s. Flynn shows how the Satanic Panic affected the way law enforcement operated, specifically in more rural towns, and heavily mirrors a lot of things that were said about the West Memphis Three in real life. She also sheds light on the early true crime community, giving a decent representation of the different types of enthusiasts that essentially created the foundation of the community.
Overall, it’s a pretty good book. I would recommend it for anyone who is already a fan of Flynn’s other works, or anyone who enjoys really character-forward thriller novels.
The Lit Wiz