Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald

By THERESE ANNE FOWLER

Published by Hachette New Zealand

$36.99 RRP, 26 March 2013

Set against the glamorous backdrop of the Roaring Twenties, Z is the story of the golden couple who had it all, but who weren't destined for a happy ending.

'Sometimes', said Scott, 'I don't know whether Zelda and I are real or whether we are characters from one of my own novels.'

Before F. Scott Fitzgerald was a literary darling, before he'd even begun to imagine The Great Gatsby or Benjamin Button, he was a young WWI army lieutenant who fell hard for a spirited Southern belle named Zelda Sayre. The life he and Zelda would lead together in New York, Long Island, Paris, Hollywood and the French Riviera made them legends, even in their own time. Set amidst the glamour of the Jazz Age and The Lost Generation's vivid world abroad, Z vividly brings Zelda and Scott's romantic, tumultuous, extraordinary journey to life.

Zelda was the embodiment of the Jazz Age and the Roaring Twenties. She was vibrant, headstrong, complicated and misunderstood. Z is the irresistibly rich, romantic and tumultuous story of Zelda and Scott Fitzgerald, set in seductive settings. Filled with larger-than-life characters such as Ernest Hemingway, Sara and Gerald Murphy and Gertrude Stein, we watch the evolution of this iconic woman as she lived large and ached to find her own identity in the shadow of her celebrated husband.

About the Author

Therese Anne Fowler has a BA in sociology/cultural anthropology and an MFA in creative writing. Her work has won honours from the Faulkner Society and Thomas Wolfe Fiction prize competitions. She was an editorial assistant and taught undergraduate fiction writing before leaving academia to write full-time. An Illinois native, she has two grown sons and two nearly grown stepsons, and currently lives in Florida with her husband.

Early praise for Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald:

'Fowler's Zelda is all we would expect and more, for she's daring and unconventional yet profoundly and paradoxically rooted in Southern gentility. (Her father, after all, was a judge in Montgomery, Ala.) Once she meets the handsome Scott, however, her life takes off on an arc of indulgence and decadence that still causes us to shake our heads in wonder. The early years are sublime, for both Scott and Zelda are high-spirited, passionate and deeply committed to each other. There's even a touching naïveté in the immoderation of their lives, a childlike awe in their encountering the confection of Paris for the first time.

With the success of This Side of Paradise, Scott quickly becomes lionized, and life becomes an endless series of parties. Fowler reminds us of the astonishing social circle within which the Fitzgeralds lived and moved and had their being—soirées with Picasso and his mistress, with Cole Porter and his wife, with Gerald and Sara Murphy, Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas, Ezra Pound and Jean Cocteau.

Scott's friendship with Hemingway verges on a love affair – at least it's close enough to one to make Zelda jealous. We witness Zelda's increasing desperation to establish her own identity – rather difficult when Scott "claims" some of her stories as his own. She also studies ballet and gets an invitation to join a dance company in Italy, but Scott won't allow her to leave. He bullies her, and she fights back. Ultimately, both of these tragic, pathetic and grand characters are torn apart by their inability to love or leave each other. Fowler has given us a lovely, sad and compulsively readable book.' Kirkus, starred review

'An utterly engrossing portrayal of Zelda Fitzgerald and the legendary circles in which she moved. In the spirit of Loving Frank and The Paris Wife, Therese Anne Fowler shines a light on Zelda instead of her more famous husband, providing both justice and the voice she struggled to have heard in her lifetime.' Sara Gruen, New York Times bestselling author of Water For Elephants

'Fowler channels the lightning in a bottle that's Zelda Fitzgerald in a novel that is as heartbreaking as it is mesmerizing. About love, desire, betrayal, and one extraordinary woman struggling to shine in the world – even as the one she loves best is drawing the shades. Just magnificent.' Caroline Leavitt, New York Times bestselling author of Pictures of You

'Fowler's richly imagined portrait of the Jazz Age's literary royalty is a wonderfully engaging read. With crisp dialogue and vivid descriptions, Z delivers both a compelling love story and a poignant tale of a woman coming into her own as an artist.' – Heidi Durrow, New York Times bestselling author of The Girl Who Fell From the Sky