Book Review: THE GREAT GATSBY, by F. Scott Fitzgerald

For the longest time, I thought this book was an old school detective novel, like The Big Sleep or, I dunno, The Great Train Robbery (isn't that a movie?)--but I couldn't figure out what the hell a "gatsby" was. A gun, maybe.

Now I know better. The great Gatsby is a person, and a very interesting one, at that...

I liked GATSBY (the book) very much, but I'm not sure I could tell you why. I suppose it's something about the haunted quality of Jay Gatsby and his many-roomed, ghost-filled mansion, something about Nick Carraway (our brave narrator) in his rundown cottage, surrounded by millionaires. And there are love triangles, and scandals, and extravagant parties, but some of the best moments of Fitzgerald's book are the most stark and utterly bewitching: Nick and Gatsby searching Gatsby's mansion for cigarettes and finding only two stale cigarettes that they smoke beside a dark window; the descriptions of Daisy's voice, Jordan's posture; Gatsby gazing out over the bay at the green light that marks the end of his love's lakeside dock. That's downright eerie.

I will be reading GATSBY many times, I can assure you.

RATING: 5