The Chosen and the Beautiful
Nghi Vo
Rave
Positive
Mixed
Pan
The Chosen and the Beautiful
Nghi Vo
Rave
Positive
Mixed
Pan
Rave
Positive
Mixed
Pan
Vo’s adaptation of The Great Gatsby is completely ridiculous, and I love it with the passion of a thousand burning hearts.
One expects to find novels like this on the shelves of a dream library, where all the great books that were never written reside.
The Chosen and the Beautiful deserves to be read as closely as the book that inspired it. Vo’s prose is beautifully supple, and the novel shines when she reads Gatsby against the grain.
Vo has always demonstrated a talent for vivid and imaginative descriptions, a skill she turns up to eleven in The Chosen and the Beautiful.
... a speculative take that reads even truer to the source material now than the original. Wielding the dexterous literary voice she flexed in her Singing Hills Cycle, Vo breathes fresh life and insight into the characters, themes and atmosphere. This is a reimagining that not only does justice to the original, but unearths what was subtext, centers what was margin, and cuts into the very meat of Fitzgerald’s intent. It’s a big task, to reinvent the wheel, particularly one so beloved and well-studied. Vo is a prime example of how a deft writer can do it successfully, strengthening the canon with the palimpsest of her interpretation.
This rewrite shakes up the homogeneity of the story yet stays true (in its way) to the Fitzgerald original.
What I didn’t expect was a fantasy novel that not only treats Gatsby with respect, but that ingeniously makes use of Fitzgerald’s plot and even swatches of his dialogue, not to critique or parody the original, but to find ways of expanding its scope to address contemporary anxieties. Nghi Vo’s The Chosen and the Beautiful does all of this. Being queer, being an outsider, being Asian, being a woman—these may not have been much on Fitzgerald’s mind, but they make sense in terms of Fitzgerald’s overall critique of American values, and at times they fit in almost seamlessly with that critique.
The Chosen and the Beautiful makes...changes to Fitzgerald’s novel without sacrificing the gossamer charm of the original.
Nghi Vo perfectly strikes that balance of the new and the familiar.
Retelling the original story with a queer Asian main character is quite the hefty challenge, yet Vo masters it beautifully.
I absolutely didn’t expect Nghi Vo’s next book to take up the case of the much sidelined Jordan Baker from The Great Gatsby and retell her story—but she has, and she’s done it so beautifully and so spellbindingly that it will captivate readers worldwide.
Nghi Vo delivers a Gatsby for the new 20s: decadent, dangerous, and dripping with magic.
Vo remains an excellent stylist and her magically infused alternate history and her version of Baker are both interesting enough that at times readers may wish the narrative wasn’t constrained by Fitzgerald’s original plotting and characters. Recommended for fans of Vo’s previous shorter work, or for readers of historical fantasy in general..
... extraordinary.
Vo has crafted a retelling that, in many ways, surpasses the original, adding logic and depth to characters’ motivations while still—uncannily—unspooling the familiar story. Astonishingly crafted, with luscious prose and appeal for both fans of the original and those who always felt The Great Gatsby missed the mark. With magic creeping in around the edges, this is a unique, well-developed, and haunting Gatsby retelling..