Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald - Therese Anne Fowler

Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald

By Therese Anne Fowler

  • Release Date: 2013-03-26
  • Genre: Historical Fiction
4 Score: 4 (From 554 Ratings)

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Book Synopsis

THE INSPIRATION FOR THE TELEVISION DRAMA Z: THE BEGINNING OF EVERYTHING

With brilliant insight and imagination, Therese Anne Fowler's New York Times bestseller Z brings us Zelda's irresistible story as she herself might have told it.

I wish I could tell everyone who thinks we're ruined, Look closer…and you'll see something extraordinary, mystifying, something real and true. We have never been what we seemed.

When beautiful, reckless Southern belle Zelda Sayre meets F. Scott Fitzgerald at a country club dance in 1918, she is seventeen years old and he is a young army lieutenant stationed in Alabama. Before long, the "ungettable" Zelda has fallen for him despite his unsuitability: Scott isn't wealthy or prominent or even a Southerner, and keeps insisting, absurdly, that his writing will bring him both fortune and fame. Her father is deeply unimpressed. But after Scott sells his first novel, This Side of Paradise, to Scribner's, Zelda optimistically boards a train north, to marry him in the vestry of St. Patrick's Cathedral and take the rest as it comes.

What comes, here at the dawn of the Jazz Age, is unimagined attention and success and celebrity that will make Scott and Zelda legends in their own time. Everyone wants to meet the dashing young author of the scandalous novel—and his witty, perhaps even more scandalous wife. Zelda bobs her hair, adopts daring new fashions, and revels in this wild new world. Each place they go becomes a playground: New York City, Long Island, Hollywood, Paris, and the French Riviera—where they join the endless party of the glamorous, sometimes doomed Lost Generation that includes Ernest Hemingway, Sara and Gerald Murphy, and Gertrude Stein.

Everything seems new and possible. Troubles, at first, seem to fade like morning mist. But not even Jay Gatsby's parties go on forever. Who is Zelda, other than the wife of a famous—sometimes infamous—husband? How can she forge her own identity while fighting her demons and Scott's, too?

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Latest Impressions

  • A new take makes for great reading

    4
    By AmyNC2012
    Tho was on my to-read list since I read The Paris Wife. This captures the spirit, life and times of the Fitzgeralds, without mocking or shaming them. You get to see Zelda as a loving wife, not the crazed albatross she's often portrayed as. It was an enjoyable read.

  • Z

    5
    By Brunetta4u
    This book is an important part of the (JazzAge, 20's, literary great's) puzzle. A fascinating look into the quick rise and the slow, dark descent of two brilliant, misguided people who loved one another while trying to leave their stamp on the world.

  • Zelda

    5
    By Deanna.linda.j
    I am in love with this book. Must read for anyone who is interested in this era and this couple. I think I might read it again!

  • Wonderfully written

    5
    By BarbaraC36
    I so enjoyed reading this novel. The characters come to life, the story is compelling and the writing style is so lovely and lyrical. I read one previous book of hers but liked this one ever so much better. Looking forward to her next...

  • Z

    4
    By temamer
    I am a huge fan of F Scott Fitzgerald's books, but based my knowledge of Zelda on the rumor & innuendo. Including the cruel Hemingway in A Moveable Feast. This book helped me understand both the Fitzgerald's & their tragic relationship.

  • Another Time

    5
    By Chef/author
    I hope that, in another life, I was Zelda Fitzgerald. In Z, A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald, Therese Anne Fowler has captured the most amazing and interesting character of a real-life person and spun a fascinating tale of what her life was like as the wife of F. Scott Fitzgerald. The voice of the book is intriguing and unique and I couldn't help but be drawn into the 1920's and wish I were living this glamorous, chaotic life...until it came crashing down. Fowler has managed not only to grab my attention for the reading of this book but also to rekindle an interest in the writings of F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, and Ezra Pound. I even put on a Cole Porter album to listen to while reading the last few chapters. If you'd like to be transported to another time and place do not hesitate to read Z. Victoria Allman author of: SEAsoned: A Chef's Journey with Her Captain

  • Wonderful and riveting

    5
    By CoCo day
    This book was a great read. It was written so effortless for such a complicated story and for a couple I knew not much about, I felt like I knew them and loved them despite all their flaws.

  • Avid Reader

    5
    By Cmad4hunter
    PERFECT. Great themes, characters and atmosphere! What more can you ask for.

  • Zelda from a past life?

    5
    By Anndra75
    I am not a book reviewer. I don't write exceptionally well. But I know what I like and this book is it. I was drawn in and completely absorbed from the first page. I finished it in 3 days. I will definitely go back and re-read it as there is much to be admired and studied. I felt like Zelda's reality was MY reality. Her words and feelings were my words and feelings. While reading the book, I caught myself wondering if the author could have been Zelda in a past life? That is how authentic this book reads. Enjoy!

  • Zelda Fitzgerald

    5
    By Mommy's Night Out
    While this is clearly written with sympathy toward Zelda, it is extremely well written and captures the essence of the out of control, Jazz Age abuses of the 1920s.

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