FAQ About The Great Gatsby

"The Great Gatsby" is a novel set in the Roaring Twenties, a period of post-World War I prosperity, excess, and decadence. The novel is narrated by Nick Carraway, a young man from the Midwest who moves to New York to work in the bond business. He becomes involved with the wealthy and glamorous Jay Gatsby, a man who throws lavish parties and is rumored to have made his fortune through illegal means.

Gatsby is in love with Nick's cousin, Daisy Buchanan, who is married to the brutish Tom Buchanan. Gatsby asks Nick to help him reunite with Daisy, and the two begin an affair. Meanwhile, Tom becomes suspicious of Gatsby and sets out to expose him as a fraud.

The tension between the characters builds to a climax when Gatsby is killed in a case of mistaken identity. The novel ends with Nick reflecting on the emptiness and moral decay of the wealthy and privileged world he has been a part of and the impossibility of recapturing the past.