or an American Werewolf in West Egg
Why, hello, old sports! Earlier this year, upon hearing the news that F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby was now in the public domain, I made a joke about adding werewolves to it. That tweet is a joke no longer! Behold: THE GREATEST GATSBY, or an American Werewolf in West Egg!
Experience F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic Jazz Age novel of lost love, wild parties, and the impossible promise of the American Dream the way it was almost certainly never meant to be: with mercenaries, meditations on violence and masculinity, and a much more rewarding story for Nick and Jordan.
Oh, and also? Secret international cabals of werewolf assassins.
Nick Carraway, a traumatized soldier trying to escape his past, moves to Long Island in search of a new – and quiet – future. Instead, he’s drawn into the increasingly tangled orbits of his cousin Daisy, lovelorn and imprisoned by her past; her husband Tom, a jackbooted corporate fixer; the alluring and sardonic Jordan Baker; and, of course, his neighbor Gatsby, a millionaire playboy renowned for his excess as much as the mysteries surrounding him. What follows is a stirring (and still surprisingly familiar) tale of romance, revelations, reefer, redemption – and revenge.
The book will be available on April 20th, but if you’d like to pre-order your copy today, you can do so right here!
Signed paperback (via Square)
Digital copy (via Square)
Kindle copy (via Amazon)
Also, if you’d prefer to just PayPal me, or if you want a review copy or something, shoot me an email and we’ll see if we can work something out.
If you’d like more information first, you can check out the first chapter by clicking right here. I’ve also taken the liberty of answering a few questions below.
Q: How much of THE GREATEST GATSBY is just, y’know, THE GREAT GATSBY?
A: About 50% of THE GREATEST GATSBY is Fitzgerald’s original text. Another 40%, give or take, is me. The remaining 10% is plots and ideas borrowed from GROSSE POINTE BLANK and a couple of Warren Zevon songs, and about 1% is just straight-up Bruce Springsteen lyrics.
Q: But all the new stuff is very obvious then, right? Just jarring piles of sarcasm and anachronisms and weird and obvious asides? Like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, where the author artlessly threw the reanimated corpses in there every couple of paragraphs without any greater purpose?
A: Actually, no. Other than the word “werewolf,” the prose is kept alarmingly similar to what was first published in 1925. Spookily the same. Like, to the point that some readers genuinely couldn’t tell what was new and what was already there. And by “some readers” I obviously mean Monica; she’s worried I did too good of a job.
Q: What’s the sex, drugs, and violence quotient?
A: More than in the original, though not by terribly much, and it’s all very tasteful, I promise. Definitely more of the drugs than the other two, and even then only “reefer.” Also, for whatever it’s worth, I’d argue that I only actually expounded on what was already suggested by the original text.
Q: But what about swear words? This is you, after all.
A: Single-digits. And none of the big ones. This thing is barely PG-13. Perfect for the kids and grandparents!
Q: Okay, but is it historically accurate? You are famously not a person who was alive in the 1920s.
A: I would respectfully argue that THE GREATEST GATSBY is actually MORE accurate than the original. Fitzgerald was definitely living in a bubble where even poor ol’ Nick, the degenerate outcast, was still from a successful family and able to go to Yale. The text was kind of racist, and definitely elitist – like, in the first chapter, Fitzgerald mentions drinks just appearing without acknowledging the literal existence of the butler carrying them. He says the drinks just walked in themselves! Also? The ’20s were a fucking mess of anarchist bombings and protests and racism and civil rights movements and the government trying to destroy the environment. What a weird time, right? How’s someone today ever going to relate to that? Anyway, Fitzgerald barely mentions any of it; I make the turmoil a main part of Nick’s story.
Q: Is there anything else we should know?
A; Only that THE GREATEST GATSBY came out way better than it probably should have and I’m really proud of this. Also, this is probably more The Wolf Man than, I don’t know, Ginger Snaps? What’s a really gory one? All I’m saying is, temper your werewolf expectations accordingly.