A short coda to Vo’s queer reimagining of The Great Gatsby, her novel The Chosen and the Beautiful, Don’t Sleep With the Dead is a nice addition to the world Vo created - and a sharp future for Nick Carraway. Set some years after the events of the novel, this novella is about Nick Carraway, now a famous novelist, and feeling haunted by Jay Gatsby, still.

I enjoyed this addition to The Chosen and the Beautiful.

I have published this review to Fable and will be creating a post for @brintsbooks on Instagram tomorrow (3/8/25)

“Thanks to Tor Publishing Group and NetGalley for the opportunity to review this book before its release.

This story is about Nick Carraway (yes, that Nick Carraway) and his pursuit to find Jay Gatsby (yes, THAT Jay Gatsby) after he sees him one night, years after he publishes the book that once made him a famous writer. To avoid spoilers, and as the book is quite short, I shouldn’t go into much detail besides that 😂.

Overall, this book was good, solid, and has great writing. I was captivated by the plot, seeing as it explores a side of Carraway’s character that has been suspected for years but was never clear in the original work. The author does a great job building this alternate reality of 1930’s NYC in little time. On the other hand, some of the plot felt unnecessary and distracting from the character’s main mission. I would have enjoyed the book more if there was more interaction between Carraway and Gatsby. “

1939, seventeen years after the frenetic parties and events of 1922, Nick Carraway has his comfortable existence jarred out of line when he sees the ghost of Jay Gatsby. Not all is as it seems, and Nick knows better than to take anything at face value.

Like Nghi Vo's other work, this is an intriguing novella. It's billed as a companion novel to The Chosen and the Beautiful rather than a sequel, which is why I picked it up, as Vo's debut is her only backlist book I have not yet read. I suspect many readers may feel more comfortable with picking up The Chosen and the Beautiful first, but I enjoyed the air of mystery presented in Don't Sleep with the Dead. We have a seventeen year gap in plot, and it's clear that Vo's paranormal spin had big implications, but we never get all the details. But the beauty of a novella is that you have to feel a little uncomfortable with the incomplete knowledge, whether you were given that knowledge in a prior book or not. But if you know the characters of The Great Gatsby, you'll be able to navigate this.

I enjoyed the audio and felt that the narration increased some of the mystery around the book. Just know that if you are listening, the book does not cut off at the end unintentionally. The last punctuation of the book is, in fact, an em-dash.

⋆.˚✮ 4 stars ✮˚.⋆

⤿ Thank you to Tor Books and Tordotcom for the arc through netgalley and a physical arc in exchange for an honest review!

this was an excellent novella addition to The Chosen & The Beautiful by Nghi Vo, adding a bit more depth to what that ending means. instead of following Jordyn, this novella follows Nick years after the summer that they all spend together, at the eve of World War 2. he’s struggling with the material world that means to tear him apart, and the magical world that may just destroy him and his hope anyway.

instead of sitting quiet, Nick is following a lead that Gatsby, while in Hell may not actually be dead. he has visions of him, and visions of a devil-like creature and so he goes and tries to find out what happens. is this because of his love for Gatsby? or his own untethered need to be involved with something? that is for the reader to find out.

even just the snippets of Jordyn & Nick content we got too filled my heart, they have such an interesting ‘almost’ type of relationship. even Nick confesses in this book there may be a part of him that’s never quite over her, but it’ll never happen. even just seeing Nick struggle with what’s happening in the world and turn to the magic was super fun, as the feeling of magic just barely brushes past the reader in the first book, but now that world is on full display and I think it was a welcome addition to the novella.

↬ <u>trigger warnings:</u> blood and gore, death of a friend mentioned, abuse of power

˖ ࣪ ⋆୨୧⋆ ࣪ ˖ quotes ˖ ࣪ ⋆୨୧⋆ ࣪ ˖
✧ “The good thing - the only good thing - about the worst finally happening is that it has happened” (1)

✧ “I started forward not sure what I was going to do, but it was the devil who looked over his shoulder at me, nothing human, never human, and my nerve broke into a thousand pieces.” (57)

✧ “Jordyn had a way of existing harder than everyone else around her, even when she was sitting in the corner and watching everyone make fools of themselves.” (74)

This book was great! It was creepy and very well written. Thank you to Netgalley for the arc. I enjoyed it so much.

Thank you NetGalley and Tor for providing me with an arc for Don’t Sleep With The Dead by Nghi Vo.

There are so many things to love about the writing and narrative. One of the first things that hooked me was how ico was able to replicate Fitzgerald’s writing style (lots of commas, long prose, easily accessible language, tone, limited first person pov with an unreliable narrator). With a novel this iconic it’s definitely a challenge to breathe new life into these character and Vo has done a fantastic job with the eery and mystical tone and the essence of these characters’ personalities.

Thank you to Netgalley and Tor for an advance copy of the audiobook.

This said it was a standalone companion novella that you could read without The Chosen and the Beautiful and I’m undecided. Added context would have made this much easier on me. Nick was already an unreliable narrator so having an unreliable view of the surrounding events made it hard to lock down what was happening.

This is a standalone companion novella to Vo's The Chosen and The Beautiful, which is a reimaging of The Great Gatsby. This novel follows Nick Carraway - a novelist - who is currently living in New York, writing columns in the paper after publishing his novel. However, Nick is an unreliable narrator and has been pretending at a lot of things such as being straight, being a human, and acting like he can't remember what happened that summer of 1922. When he is saved during a police attack, he thinks he sees a face from his past, Jay Gatsby. Nick becomes obsessed with finding out who knows where is he or if it was actually him.

This book was fascinating. I thought it was such an interesting new venture of The Great Gatsby and the characters from that novel. When I picked this up, I didn't read closely that it was linked to Vo's other novel, so I went in totally blind, but it is a standalone, so you will be fine. I do now want to read the other book though! Vo has a way with words, and I liked how she frequently implanted that Nick was an unreliable narrator throughout the short novella. Vo does like her demons lol (I am working through The City in Glass currently and the demons are there as well). This is a quick read, great for fans of The Great Gatsby!

Check my IG highlight ARCs for my instagram story review at @the.bookish.dietitian

Thank you NetGalley for this arc!

The author does a fantastic job at retaining the tone and style of writing lent from the original Great Gatsby text. And I found the writing style compelling for me. However, I did find myself confused for parts of the book and maybe I needed to revisit the first in order to get full context but definitely not a book you can go into without having read the first.

3.5

A mesmerizing and hauntingly beautiful companion novella to Vo's "The Chosen and the Beautiful". Once again Nick Carraway takes up the mantle of being an unreliable narrator. A bestselling author and paper soldier, Nick is haunted by the events of 1922. He is forced to face more than one skeleton in his closet and his obsession with Gatsby takes a turn.

Many thanks to Netgalley, Macmillan, and Tor for an advanced readers copy of the book.

I enjoyed this story, despite being a bit confused at times. It's a bit dark, and touches on a few heavier topics. The writing style is absolutely what I've come to expect and love from Nghi Vo.
This is labelled as a standalone companion, but I think (and I'm guessing here) that to get the full experience that you should definitely have read The Chosen and the Beautiful first. That is the one story by Nghi Vo that I haven't read yet, but it's on my list.

That's not to say you can't enjoy this story, I'm just assuming that some of the things which confused me about the world and relationships and such would make a lot more sense with a bit of prior knowledge. I am looking forward to revisiting this story again after I've read The Chosen and the Beautiful though!

I was a bit confused for a great deal of this novel mostly because I don’t think the world building is anywhere near where it could be. This is such a great concept for a book, but being thrown right into the chaos of what’s going on. Even after the chaos settles down, there’s very little explanation, even over time, as to where we are, what the world is, and I had to speculate for the most part without any concrete idea if I was on the right track. Yes, everyone knows when gatsby took place and pretty much everyone had red gatsby, but I definitely did not feel like there was enough of this world provided to keep me interested.

I thought the dialogue was excellent and the characters themselves were well-rounded and fleshed out. Specirizally, I really liked how all the characters of the original Gatsby novel came into play, and I loved the character of Jordan. But j guess I was just left wanting more of everything. Build this world for me and show me without telling me what this world is. So, overall, I had a hard time enjoying this novel when it felt rushed and under-explained. It left a lot to be desired.

As I will be publishing my full review with The Game of Nerds, which I will be linking once it's up on the site, this is only a portion of my review.

This isn’t a love story. It is a story about love, in all its longing and yearning. It’s a story about how love can dredge a soul up from the pits of hell, despite the impossibility. It’s a story about how a man can be brought back to life through the memory of love alone. But it isn’t a love story. There is no happy ending in which Nick and Gatsby ride off into the sunset, both alive and together. But, that does not mean there is no happy ending.

There is one thing Nick is haunted by even more than the ghost of Gatsby. His heart. Or, more precisely, the question of if he even has a heart.

“‘Be a little kind to yourself, please. If you can be whoever you want, wouldn’t it be nicer to be someone you liked?’”

The ending, the final gift Gatsby gave him, was the perfect way this story could have ended. A chance to rewrite himself, to shape his own destiny. To become real in all the ways that matters to him. To give himself a heart that is truly and utterly his own. Gatsby was never going to give him his heart, but at least he gave Nick the chance to create one for himself.

So, this isn’t a love story. But, perhaps Nick can finally learn to love himself now that he has a heart of his own.

Thank you to NetGalley and Tor Publishing Group for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

I just felt very lukewarm about it overall. If it was a full-length novel I would have dnf-ed probably.

Nghi Vo's writing style is simply not for me. Much too in the magical realism & fabulism realm. C&B was the exception I think just because of having the grounding in The Great Gatsby story, which I'm familiar with. Without that, her authorial voice is lost on me.

In Don’t Sleep with the Dead, Nghi Vo revisits The Great Gatsby, this time through Nick Carraway’s haunted and unreliable perspective. Now in the late 1930s, on the eve of World War II, Nick has built a quiet life of watching and pretending—pretending to be straight, pretending to forget 1922, and pretending Gatsby is truly gone. But when he sees a familiar face in the dark, he realizes the past isn’t done with him. Dead or not, Gatsby is back—or at least, something that looks like him is.

Unlike The Chosen and the Beautiful, which hinted at magic, this novella brings the supernatural to the forefront. New York is eerie, filled with ghosts, devils, and secrets, and Nick is drawn into its underbelly in search of answers. Is he chasing Gatsby out of love, guilt, or something even darker?

This is a novella about hunger—for love, for closure, for something real. Even glimpses of Jordan Baker remind Nick of the roads never taken and the people he’s lost. Vo’s prose is sharp and dreamlike, making every moment feel both beautiful and unsettling. The line between memory and magic blurs, leaving Nick (and the reader) questioning what is real.

Though short, Don’t Sleep with the Dead is a mesmerizing, eerie, and deeply emotional read. It’s a story of love, obsession, and the ghosts that refuse to stay buried. If you loved The Chosen and the Beautiful or enjoy stories where longing lingers like a ghost, this is one you won’t want to miss. #torpublishing #dontsleepwiththedead #nghivo. #thechosenandthebeautiful

I’ll admit that The Chosen and The Beautiful was not one of my favorites, especially as I’m not especially familiar with The Great Gatsby though I did read it in high school. But I couldn’t resist the chance to read Don’t Sleep with the Dead, especially because it’s a novella. This is probably the least lush of all Vo’s books I’ve read, and I think that comes to Nick being the narrator. This is dedicated to unreliable narrators, and I like how that’s something played with in this novella, the stories we tell and the stories we believe. I struggled to follow everything happening in the first two thirds, but I love the conclusion. This is a book where the open-ended ending works really well, because again we’re dealing with an unreliable narrator and a story is only done when the teller says so. Vo continues to do really interesting things with storytelling and characters, even if much of it is going over my head.

I enjoyed the premise and poetic nature of this novella, but I don't think it should be advertised as a standalone. I felt lost at times and think I would have enjoyed this story more if I had been introduced to the characters properly in the previous novella. If you've read her previous work, I think you'll love this one!

I will be checking out more of Nghi Vo's work, as I did really enjoy her writing style.

<i>First, a thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to read an eARC of this book.</i>

This marks my 100th book I’ve read and reviewed through NetGalley, which is exciting.

Anytime I see Nghi Vo has a new book coming out, I know that I <b>must</b> read it. I love everything she writes and in my opinion, she can do no wrong.

This is set in the universe of, and is a sort of sequel to, [book:The Chosen and the Beautiful|55169019], which I also absolutely adored. [book:The Great Gatsby|41733839] was one of my favorite required readings in high school, but I have to say… Vo’s version is better.

I love Nick and his character. He is so unique and interesting, and he was the one I really felt for the most in her first book, so I was excited to see him again and see a story told from his point of view.

I also absolutely adore how lush Vo’s prose is - every sentence is like a morsel of my favorite treat, that melts on the tongue and leaves you yearning for more.

Normally a book of this length I would get through fairly quick, but I really took my time with this one, re-reading certain lines and phrases because I liked the way they tasted.

I cannot wait to buy a copy for myself - and I am so happy I read this one.

A wonderful Gatsby retelling that builds on the themes of the original while also creating something entirely new.

Thanks to NetGalley, the Publisher and Author for an eARC of this title in exchange for my review.

Don't Sleep With The Dead by Nghi Vo is a follow up/companion novella to the historical fantasy by the author, The Chosen and the Beautiful.

Like the first book, this work is rich, poetic and immersive, with elements of magical realism, questions of identity, and ponderings of the human condition and what is left of a lost love.

This return to a queer magical Great Gatsby inspired world is sharp, dark, desperate and absolutely gorgeous.

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