Book Club

I am currently re-reading one of my all-time favorite books. Which really speaks volumes for this book because I have read a lot of books in my time. A lot. It's an American classic and I am sharing it today on Book Club because I feel like every American adult should have this book on their must read list. I know that classic literature is not everyone's thing (even though it is my thing since I was a Lit major in college), but I promise this one is actually enjoyable to read.

This week I'm sharing...

Here is a synopsis...

In 1922, F. Scott Fitzgerald announced his decision to write "something new--something extraordinary and beautiful and simple + intricately patterned." That extraordinary, beautiful, intricately patterned, and above all, simple novel became The Great Gatsby, arguably Fitzgerald's finest work and certainly the book for which he is best known. A portrait of the Jazz Age in all of its decadence and excess, Gatsby captured the spirit of the author's generation and earned itself a permanent place in American mythology. Self-made, self-invented millionaire Jay Gatsby embodies some of Fitzgerald's--and his country's--most abiding obsessions: money, ambition, greed, and the promise of new beginnings. "Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgiastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that's no matter--tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther.... And one fine morning--" Gatsby's rise to glory and eventual fall from grace becomes a kind of cautionary tale about the American Dream.

It's also a love story, of sorts, the narrative of Gatsby's quixotic passion for Daisy Buchanan. The pair meet five years before the novel begins, when Daisy is a legendary young Louisville beauty and Gatsby an impoverished officer. They fall in love, but while Gatsby serves overseas, Daisy marries the brutal, bullying, but extremely rich Tom Buchanan. After the war, Gatsby devotes himself blindly to the pursuit of wealth by whatever means--and to the pursuit of Daisy, which amounts to the same thing. "Her voice is full of money," Gatsby says admiringly, in one of the novel's more famous descriptions. His millions made, Gatsby buys a mansion across Long Island Sound from Daisy's patrician East Egg address, throws lavish parties, and waits for her to appear. When she does, events unfold with all the tragic inevitability of a Greek drama, with detached, cynical neighbor Nick Carraway acting as chorus throughout. Spare, elegantly plotted, and written in crystalline prose, The Great Gatsby is as perfectly satisfying as the best kind of poem.

~ via Amazon.com

If you have never actually read this book before (I know we were all supposed to read it in high school), I highly recommend it. And if you did actually read it in school, you need to read it again. As an adult, you will have a completely different perspective and take-away from this book. Promise. I have read it probably 8+ times and every time I read it, I find something new that makes me enjoy it even more. Then again, I'm a literature nerd, so of course I love this book. It's short (only 180 pages) and exposes the glamorous, yet darker side of the American Dream. Just read it. You won't be disappointed.

And in case you weren't already aware, they are making a new film version of this book and I'm pretty excited about it. Good 'ole Leo DiCaprio has been cast in the leading role as Jay Gatsby, which I think is going to be amazing. You better believe I will be in the theater on May 10th to see this movie.