Gillian Flynn

'Rosemary's Baby' is one of my all-time favorite books. I love that it just ends with, you know, 'Hey, the devil's in the world, and guess what? Mom kind of likes him!' And that's the end.

I find, the older I get, the more surprised I am about how hesitant people are to say what they really want, what they really dream about, what really drives them. It's as if sometimes we're sort of embarrassed, as we get older, to be transparent about that. But you save so much time if you're transparent about what you want.

I just think - the Midwest, if you grow up there, you're deathly afraid of putting on airs. Any time a Midwesterner criticizes someone, it's usually involving some form of being too big for your britches.

I love a good worst-case scenario. My brain just kind of works that way. I like that idea of how much a person can get away with, and why.

I always loved ghost stories and haunted house stories, whether they were done in a fantasy way or done in a realistic way.

Even good characters have their dark sides, and I think it is important that women aren't seen as innately good.

I don't think I'm naturally a good person. I think some people have an innate goodness to them, and I am sort of proud of the fact that I kind of keep myself in check, probably because I have awesome parents.

I'm probably a guy's girl, although I hate that phrase. I tend to have more close male friends than I do female friends, and I always have. I would say that of my 10 close friends, seven are men.

I am not someone who has hobbies. I have tried knitting, and I can't figure it out.

The number of mystery and horror writers I've met who are just the sanest and the nicest people... it's crazy. Maybe it's because the writing gets something out of the system?

The best crime reporters don't mind charging in - but they also know how to do it as decent human beings.

One of my biggest peeves is when the writer hasn't given you enough information to figure everything out. You should be able to go back to the beginning of 'Gone Girl,' after you've already read it and you know everything, and say, 'Check - check - yes, she gave us that information.'

For me, suspense is always harder and better than going for the quick, outright scare.

I've never been interested in watching or reading anything because it's the hero's story. I don't feel the need to be inspired by the character or learn a lesson. I feel the need to be engaged by them.

I've wondered if 'Harry Potter' would have been as big if it was 'Harriet Potter.' Now that I've written a screenplay - and raising a son in particular - I'm looking at story content and realizing how limited women are onscreen.

I think women are very ambidextrous. We don't think twice about reading a book or a movie starring guys. But for guys, it's, like, 'Oh my God, that's a woman thing.' So with my son, I very carefully portion out the female heroes and characters to make sure he's getting an equal amount.

I love Robin Wright's character in 'House of Cards' because she's a bona fide villain. She's a not-nice person in a believable way; you can see her working in the world.

What I tell myself is that there is never going to be another 'Gone Girl' for me. I mean, I really believe that. I think I'll write other good books; I have faith in that.

There are so many good books, I don't want to only read within one particular type.

I love Joyce Carol Oates. I love Margaret Atwood, T.C. Boyle. Arthur Phillips is always consistent.

I've always been a mystery fan. My very first grown-up book, I distinctly remember going to the library and my mom helping me pick out an Agatha Christie book. I was in fifth grade or something and very proud of being in the adult fiction aisles. I tore through 'The Mysterious Affair at Styles.'

I think that women really entwine with the people that they become close to in a way that men don't - and so, when they are forced to disentwine, you can't remove the vines without doing some damage.

I think women do have that fatal streak to them that's partly because it's been romanticized, the martyr complex - 'Look what you did to me!'

You have to be pretty selfless to have a child, who doesn't give a lot back to you.

I have two kids, and anyone who has a kid in order to feel loved is going to be in trouble because kids are first and foremost all about themselves. They'll say they love you, but 10 seconds later they'll turn on you.

There's a book by Anne Rivers Siddons called 'The House Next Door' that I just think is one of the all-time great haunted-house stories. I think that's one of the all-time greatest.

I do love 'The Turn of the Screw' - I just think that one's always so disturbing.

I think everyone self-mythologizes.

I was very lucky to grow up in a household that really valued storytelling and didn't find it frivolous.

I love 'Fatal Attraction.'

Books and movies are kind of my two great loves. I don't have too many other actual hobbies. That's pretty much it.

I spent a lot of - too much of - my childhood watching movies and thinking about movies.

I had been laid off from 'Entertainment Weekly 'right before I started writing 'Gone Girl.'

I was always someone who wanted to write. I was a real shy, bookworm-ish kid, and I think my earliest stuff was fairly dark.

In marriage, it's best to keep perspective. Get out of your head and get some perspective.

I'm not hyper-opinionated, but when I do have an opinion, I'm very stubborn, and I want to persuade everyone to my point of view.

Writing has certainly helped me explore about 20,000 versions of my authentic self. I suppose that's what most writers discover if they write long enough: there are a lot of selves roaming around in there.

My first two novels featured narrators who were aggressively unattached: They couldn't form any sort of genuine relationship. So I had thoroughly explored the geography of loneliness and isolation.

It's important to tell stories, and it's a worthwhile thing to do.

Because I'm a woman writing about women who do bad things, that's somehow very 'other.' When men write that, it's called a novel. It's just a book.

The skill set that lets you be alone in your pyjamas for two years writing a book is not the same skill set that lets you go on television shows like 'The View' or 'Late Night With Jimmy Fallon.'

I mostly go under the radar, which is fantastic because I would not be a good famous person.

I like the idea that people who see 'Gone Girl' are possibly going to come out with incredibly different reactions to it - not just between men and women, but if you are in a good relationship or a bad relationship. Everyone is going to bring their own bundle of prejudices and viewpoints and experiences to it.

I've always read in order to figure out people more, and that includes bad people and good people.

I want books to give me insight into the way people's brains work and hearts work, and that's what engages me.

I could not have written a novel if I hadn't been a journalist first, because it taught me that there's no muse that's going to come down and bestow upon you the mood to write. You just have to do it. I'm definitely not precious.

The midwest is great because it hasn't been entirely claimed. There's more room to write about it; it's harder to write about New York, because even if you've never been there, you think you know what it's like. To do it in any sort of fresh way is trickier.

I get really tense during the first draft. Really tense. That's not great for my family, because the first draft usually takes about a year.

I've seen movies that are slavishly devoted to books but don't work because they haven't turned it into a movie: they've turned it into a dramatisation of the different scenes.

Being a novelist, you can roam around with a story and indulge yourself.