The Chosen and the Beautiful by Nghi Vo
“The Chosen and the Beautiful” by Nghi Vo is the story of Daisy Buchanan, Tom, and Nick Carraway. This is a reinvention of The Great Gatsby and about Jordan and Nick. Jordan goes to bed early because she’s to play in a tennis tournament the next day. But really it’s because Daisy goes up to her room first.
Jordan cuts paper from a book in the shape of a lion and Daisy coos her approval. The paper lion comes alive. The Gatsby house is lit up everywhere, even covering the full moon. It’s magic and money. Gatsby’s parties are easy, your every wish is granted and you must be beautiful and bright. Jordan is the protagonist in this Gatsby re-make and she sleeps with several of the men either in their beds or in a closet. Other guests disappear together or smoke hashish. She and Nick spend weekends together.
Daisy and Tom married nine months after the Armistice in Louisville, bells rang and life returned. Nick said Jordan could have him but did she want him? Maybe just for the summer, she told her aunt Justine. This story follows the classic Fitzgeralds with a twist on the main characters. The author wants the reader to know the other people who are there. What is the mystery about Gatsby? Was he a spy during the war? Was he on the enemy’s side? All this is here in Vo’s novel.
Jordan and Nick go to the Lyric for drinks under the subway, then to a small restaurant for corned beef hash and eggs. She gives Nick pajamas so they can stay at Aunt Justine’s for the night. Jordan says she’s going to The Cendrillon but he says he’s not like that. The Cendrillon paid off everyone including the Commissioner. The first time she went she gave the password and wore a red rosebud pinned to her dress and a pair of Aunt Justine’s diamond earrings. She danced with a fat black girl in a tuxedo, then with a handsome young boy in a flaming red dress. She had a tab there under the name Miss Shanghai that got her delicious drinks. Later she runs into Gatsby and he begs her to have Nick bring Daisy to his house in West Egg on Long Island. She agrees as it’s hard to say no to Gatsby.
We are flashbacked to Daisy who gets totally drunk and vomits. She’s supposed to marry Tom Buchanan the next day and go to a rehearsal dinner that night. Jordan runs a bath for Daisy and they both get into it and play. Jordan cuts Daisy’s exact double from paper so she will be the one to go to the party to greet the guests. In the garden, the paper double burns, and only a pile of paper and ash remains.
Later Jordan tells Tom how he had been in an auto accident with a woman named Pilar, who worked at the hotel where they’d stayed. When they arrive at Gatsby’s house Nick describes how Gatsby built the entire new house from marble floors to the books, all of it for Daisy. Jordan pushes Nick down onto his knees and she steps out of her drawers. The rooms are all for Daisy and the closets are filled with dresses, all for her. Gatsby points out all his beautiful treasures to Daisy who is delighted with everything. He flings his pastel shirts and they float like multicolored birds. Michael Klipespringer is urged to play the piano while in his striped underwear and black concert shoes. It sounds sad and tears run down his cheeks.
Jordan realizes she’s left her clothes at Gatsby’s and she wears Daisies. She and Nick are an item in the gossip columns the following day. Daisy is with Tom and there is tension between them. A small boy named Khai cuts gold paper into bright orange flowers, Jordan remembers the paper lion and the paper Daisy. It’s real but silly. Asian people spread out a huge piece of paper and dance around it, spinning faster and faster, a small girl in the middle. Nick sends her home but Gatsby needs him to stay. The next day she goes to Chinatown to a Chinese restaurant and Khai comes in with a group, bringing bottles of alcohol and cut-out papers. Khai shows her how to cut it and how to let it fly. Another boy cuts a beautiful lady who prances along the walls and Khai makes other figures such as flowers and a dragon that fly around the room. Khai takes her home after she drinks too much and she admits that she’s from Tonkin and then from Louisville. She’d been raised by Eliza Baker. Daisy calls and says she misses Jordan, and that she should take aunt Justine’s car. Daisy says Nick is coming over and bringing Gatsby and then she and Gatsby are going to Greece and London, Oslo, and Philadelphia. Daisy’s child Pammy comes in with her nurse. She is precarious and smart.
Daisy wants to go to town and Tom agrees. They and Daisy take Tom’s car and Tom, Nick, and Jordan will meet them in the city. Nick and Jordan get into Gatsby’s Rolls. At the gas station, Jordan buys a pack of gum and leaves money on the counter. She spies a red-haired woman at the window above the shop, looking like a madwoman.
Tom drives faster and faster. They rent five rooms at the Plaza Hotel with five tubs. Nick pushes Jordan and Daisy together and Gatsby tells Tom Daisy never loved him, she’s grown tired of waiting for Gatsby to get rich, but loved only him.
On the way back to West Egg they see an accident and a crowd. The red-haired woman lies on a bench covered with a blanket. Tom drives away, weeping. The Rolls had not hit her, never stopped. Jordan takes the coupe and drives back to Wilson’s garage. Jordan climbs up onto the billboard advertising glasses that have looked down at them and seen everything. She goes to Daisy’s car and Khai finds her.
What becomes of Daisy and Tom and Gatsby in this version by author Vo? Jordan drives to Daisy’s to find people rushing about with huge boxes and shipping crates. Where are they going? What happens to Gatsby’s house, the main character in this novel? Author Vo has taken a classic, beloved tale of The Great Gatsby and transformed it. See if you like it on the new fiction shelf of your local library.