Fiction Breeds Fiction.... Welcome Back, Gatsby!

There's been a recent wave of fiction that further explores other works of great literature. Most notably is Gregory Maguire's Wicked, which offers insight into one of literatures's greatest "baddies"--the Wicked Witch of the West. Two others calling my name are Finn by John Clinch. The namesake of the title, is not Twain's well-known Huck, but Huck's father, "Pap." Next is a book I've picked up but still not found time to read -- March by Geraldine Brooks. This book imagines the Civil War experiences of Mr. March, the absent father in Louisa May Alcott's Little Women. Some would consider Jasper Fforde's Thursday Next novels to be on the same ilk, I disagree. While they seem to be filled to overflowing with literary allusion, they go FAR beyond any original stories into their own fantastical world.


Recently a friend directed me to read Double Bind by Chris Bohjalian. I read Bohjalian's Midwives and it seemed a bit Oprah-book-clubesque, but after reading the descriptions of this novel I am willing to give it a shot. I am a lover of The Great Gatsby and I just can't resist the idea. The book doesn't release to paperback until February 2008, so I may have to see if I can get my hands on a library copy for now.

Read the two reviews below and decide for yourself.

Fact and fiction become indistinguishable in The Double Bind: The story centers on Laurel Estabrook, a young social worker and survivor of a near-rape, who stumbles across photographs taken by a formerly homeless client and tries to understand how a man who'd taken snapshots of celebrities in the 50s and 60s might have wound up on the streets. However, an author's note tells us that Bohjalian conceived this book after being shown a batch of old photographs taken by a once-homeless man; and the actual photos of Bob "Soupy" Campbell are peppered throughout the text. In another neat twist, Bohjalian's resurrects details from The Great Gatsby, which become "real" in the context of his own novel--Laurel lives in West Egg; part of her hunt for her photographer's past involves meeting with the descendants of Daisy and Tom Buchanan.

As a writer who counts The Great Gatsby as one of the books that changed her life, this inclusion was both startling and remarkable for me. Who doesn't want one's favorite characters to come to life--even if it's only within the constraints of another fictional work? But Bohjalian chose his text wisely: no discussion of The Great Gatsby is complete without alluding to missed opportunities and unreliable sources--critical elements in Laurel's quest. And therein lies Bohjalian's true double bind: all stories--even the ones we tell ourselves--are subject to our own interpretation, and to the degree we can make others believe them.
--review by Jody Picoult

--excerpted from her review on Amazon.


Chris Bohjalian is back with an ambitious new novel that travels between Jay Gatsby’s Long Island and rural New England, between the Roaring Twenties and the twenty-first century.
When college sophomore Laurel Estabrook is attacked while riding her bicycle through Vermont’s back roads, her life is forever changed. Formerly outgoing, Laurel withdraws into her photography and begins to work at a homeless shelter. There she meets Bobbie Crocker, a man with a history of mental illness and a box of photographs that he won’t let anyone see. When Bobbie dies suddenly, Laurel discovers that he was telling the truth: before he was homeless, Bobbie Crocker was a successful photographer who had indeed worked with such legends as Chuck Berry, Robert Frost, and Eartha Kitt.

As Laurel’s fascination with Bobbie’s former life begins to merge into obsession, she becomes convinced that some of his photographs reveal a deeply hidden, dark family secret. Her search for the truth will lead her further from her old life—and into a cat-and-mouse game with pursuers who claim they want to save her.

In this spellbinding literary thriller, rich with complex and compelling characters—including Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan—Chris Bohjalian takes readers on his most intriguing, most haunting, and most unforgettable journey yet.

--a random house review

--Kate