Do you think Amy and Nick both believed in their marriage?

[AmySmiles]

No, in fact, I feel like they both totally used each other and for different reasons.

[DakotaA]

I definitely think they believed in it! I believe that they were fake with themselves and each other, and they created their relationship based on unrealistic fantasies and ideals that they were both 100% committed to. If Nick wouldn't have lost his job, there may have never been any issues between them. Unfortunately, their circumstances didn't allow them to continue their facade, and I believe they became aware of how fake their love really was.

[sush_destiny]

Amy and Nick were both manipulative and deceiving as a means to the end. The perfect example of a unhealthy, toxic marriage.

[srividyag1]

I think more than the institution of marriage, they liked each other in their own twisted way.

[leiabutler]

I think Amy 100% believed in the marriage. She loved Nick and she had her expectations of what she wanted from him and the relationship. She had hopes and dreams and the relationship only took a turn for the worst when she thought Nick no longer believed in their marriage.
Nick, I'm not so sure about. At first I think he saw their relationship as exciting, but after he was just enjoying the ride. He can't have believed in it as much as Amy if he wanted to cheat on her.

[dorebri2020]

I believe that their marriage meant something to them throughout the course of the novel. At first, I believe that they must have married for love, but towards the end, it was clearly for comfort and Nick did not love her. They clearly did not work on the relationship after marriage and were clinging to an idea.

[Atara Miles]

I think Amy cared a lot about her image and that's what prompted her to go on her maniacal, psycho plan - she refused to become the woman who was left by her husband for a younger, prettier version and ruin her carefully constructed persona of 'Amazing Amy'. She also wants to tarnish Nick's image - make him hated so that she could be, in this weird way, worshipped - feeding her ego and her abnormal thirst for vengeance. I don't think she truly cared about the marriage so much as what it represented.

[Jennifer Donovan Smith]

When Nick strangles her and realizes he couldn't live without her, that was when I realized they both were fully invested in their screwed up marriage. Unfortunately, though, it is a depiction of something that very often happens in abusive relationships: people become addicted to the drama and the abuse and they cannot function in a normal relationship afterward because it seems too boring or lacking in real emotion.

[siusantos]

At the beginning of the story, I would say yes. They seemed to love and adore each other. But I guess, due to the toll of daily life, they grew apart and began resenting each other.

[Damis Seres Rodriguez]

I don't think that either of them believed in their marriage, per se. But it's also clear to me that both Amy and Nick had deeper motives than just the ideal of love to stay together. From Amy's point of view (or at least, what I consider would be the point of view of a textbook Narcissistic Personality Disorder with antisocial tendencies) it was not as much about staying with Nick, as it was about keeping something (someone) that she considered her property, regardless if she enjoyed her relationship with him or not. Not to mention the public perception of her character and the importance for someone the likes of her entails.
Nick however,was far from being an angel in this story. And just like any other human being, had flaws that led him to dig the hole in which he fell. No completely healthy person engages in a relationship with someone so sick. Grated, people like Amy are masters of lie, and find their way into fooling everyone around them; but the harsh truth is that they always seek certain traits in their victims/partners, and Nick, at the end of it all, proved to be a typical complement of someone with a narcissistic personality.

[banevius]

I think they both believed in it when they first got married. I like that Flynn included the small moments when they first started dating that show attraction and new love. All the things that suggested they're perfect for each other were there. So they got married. Over time, I think that love faded, and they slowly started falling out of love. This gave way to Nick's cheating and Amy's plotting. Towards the end, I don't think either of them believed in marriage in the sense that we think people should. It became more a marriage of obligation rather than love.

[Barbara Larkin]

At the beginning and throughout their marriage, I would say Amy was more invested. Possibly that's what prompted her crazy plan - she had put all her hopes and dreams into the marriage and got kinda unhinged upon seeing it going down the drain, not to mention her constant pandering to the public and her image so she probably believed the stigma of being a divorcee would stick to her.

[Suzer6440 xyz]

Hmmmmm, a hard question to answer for sure. I think they pretended a lot . They didn’t seem to have an honest partnership. I saw them having a damaged relationship .

With that being said, I still really like the book and the movie.

[Rayah Raouf]

Initially, yes. Later on, no. They fell out of love and were mean and cruel to each other.

[Scarbaby]

I agree with many of us on here suggesting that Nick and Amy only gave a certain amount of themselves to one another and thus became fixated on fulfilling the roles they were accustomed to. I also believe that there were flashes, glimpses rather, of what their love could have been for them both—if they had surrendered to that love from the beginning.