beautiful little fools by jillian cantor

Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, retelling this timeless American classic from the women’s perspective. Jillian Cantor revisits the glittering Jazz Age world of F.

Each woman is pulled deeper into Jay Gatsby’s romantic obsession, with devastating consequences for all of them.

Their stories unfold in the years leading up to that fateful summer of 1922, when all three of their lives are on the brink of unraveling. Jordan Baker, Daisy’s best friend, guards a secret that derailed her promising golf career and threatens to ruin her friendship with Daisy as well.Ĭatherine McCoy, a suffragette, fights for women’s freedom and independence, and especially for her sister, Myrtle Wilson, who’s trapped in a terrible marriage. Each holds a key that can unlock the truth to the mysterious life and death of this enigmatic millionaire.ĭaisy Buchanan once thought she might marry Gatsby-before her family was torn apart by an unspeakable tragedy that sent her into the arms of the philandering Tom Buchanan. Then a diamond hairpin is discovered in the bushes by the pool, and three women fall under suspicion. Jillian Cantor revisits the glittering Jazz Age world of F. To the police, it appears to be an open-and-shut case of murder/suicide when the body of George Wilson, a local mechanic, is found in the woods nearby. Beautiful Little Fools strips the gauzy romance from The Great Gatsby down to the bare kitchen-sink melodrama of soap opera.On a sultry August day in 1922, Jay Gatsby is shot dead in his West Egg swimming pool. But if so, then Nick somehow also made them more witty and dashing. Cantor’s version testifies to a truth about gender relations in 1922 to which Nick, and possibly Fitzgerald himself, was oblivious. They are also extremely dull, and indistinguishable in voice and temperament. The men in Beautiful Little Fools are all selfish brutes and the women are, if not outright saints, remarkably noble, selfless, and long-suffering. The rest of Beautiful Little Fools follows this pattern: Any situation from the original novel in which a female character might be found at fault has been carefully reworked to render her blameless and victimized. Cantor’s is by far the weaker of the two efforts. Two recent novels- The Chosen and the Beautiful by Nghi Vo and Beautiful Little Fools by Jillian Cantor-retell The Great Gatsby’s story.

Beautiful little fools by jillian cantor