We are captivated by Jay Gatsby when we see him through Nick Carraway's eyes—but who really was Nick? Michael Farris Smith takes up the character of F. Scott Fitzgerald's narrator in this prequel to The Great Gatsby. Living through the horrors of World War I, Nick later avoids returning home, embarking instead on an odyssey of self-discovery that takes him from a doomed love affair in Paris to a frenzy of violence and debauchery in New Orleans.

"Nick is an exemplary novel. Smith delivers a moving, full-bodied depiction of a man who has been knocked loose from his moorings and is trying to claw back into his own life."—NYTimes