It's tricky to write a novel about a person who, now deceased, was once in the public eye. Therese Anne Fowler has pulled it off and then some, by depicting Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald in living color. Fowler's style is as flawless as Zelda's always was; they are the perfect match.
Zelda Sayre was a 17-year-old Montgomery, Ala., belle when she met F. Scott Fitzgerald at a dance. They were from different worlds: he was a Yankee and not a rich boy, despite graduating from Princeton; she was quite the opposite. They married, left for New York and began a life of excess in every department: romance, glamour and tragedy.
Scott called Zelda "The First Flapper," for her avant-garde attitude toward fashion and behavior. Scott was always working, more or less, on the next novel--the one that would bring in all the money they needed. Zelda followed along, occasionally asserting her own need for self-expression by writing, dancing or painting, but was ever thwarted. Scott had her short stories published under his name, guaranteeing publication as well as money. Zelda went along; she enjoyed what money could buy, so she sacrificed her artistic integrity for more and more of the good life.
What eventually undid them was Scott's out-of-control drinking, and both Zelda and Scott met untimely and tragic ends. Therese Anne Fowler has written a heartfelt novel about a woman out of her time, a woman whose talents were unsung, and she has brought a new understanding to a story we thought we knew. --Valerie Ryan, Cannon Beach Book Company, Ore.