The Glass Hotel review
A book review and some media recommendations
Kia ora,
This week I reviewed The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel. I tried my best not to spoil anything in the book for those who haven’t read it yet (it has been out almost a year) but I do talk about a few plot elements.
The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel
The Glass Hotel is the fifth novel by 42-year-old Canadian author Emily St. John Mandel, following her 2014 breakout success, Station Eleven. It was released in March last year and Barack Obama said it was one of his favourite books of 2020. I’d have to agree with Mr. Obama. It was a very enjoyable read, so much so, that I felt compelled to write about it.
The story follows a cast of characters whose lives intertwine in ways that you couldn’t have imagined. It all starts with dark graffiti on a window at a luxury hotel on Vancouver Island and moves to New York (and other places), capturing the downfall of a wide-ranging Ponzi scheme.
The Glass Hotel isn’t a standard mystery. It doesn’t deal with a single crime and then become a “who done it”. There are a number of mysteries at play all at the same time, unfolding and being answered at various stages throughout the book. At times I found myself wondering what mystery was really going to be solved or revealed. Not in a way where I didn’t know what was going on, but there were so many great layers to this book that numerous details and questions became interesting as the novel progressed.
It is also a story that deals with how our actions affect other people and ourselves. On many occasions, it presents the question of “what if?” What if I had done this? Or what if I did that instead? In an interview with Rachel Barenbaum published in The LA Review of Books, Madel said:
“We tend to think of ghost stories in classical terms, the hooded luminous specter looming in the darkened Victorian house. But maybe there are other more complicated ways of being haunted. Consider that you could be haunted by the ghost of the life you didn’t live.”
This “life you didn’t live” is an interesting element of The Glass Hotel and one that Mandel explores in a creative and interesting way.
Mandel writes in a very smooth, easy-to-read fashion and I found myself absolutely tearing through the book. That is not to say that the way she writes isn’t thought-provoking or elegant. I think it speaks more to the way that she is able to effortlessly translate her ideas onto the page. There were many moments where I slowed down and took time to admire her turn of phrase.
The structure of the book also made for great reading. Mandel isn’t afraid to jump around in time a little bit to reveal certain details or expand on our knowledge of the characters. As she explains in the interview with Barenbaum, the structure took some time to figure out. “It was a really difficult process of endless revisions and restructuring until I found something that worked. I did three very intense rounds of edits with my editors. It felt like I wrote three different books,” Mandel said.
The Glass Hotel is a story of consequence, it’s creative and wonderfully written. It is enjoyable and entertaining, but it doesn’t skimp on thought-provoking themes either.
Media recommendations
Something to read: Leonie Hayden, Ātea Editor at The Spinoff, wrote an interesting piece about Pākehā learning and speaking te reo Māori. She has some interesting thoughts and it made me consider some things I previously hadn’t thought about.
Something to watch: After defeating Serena Williams in the semi-final, three-time Grand Slam champion Naomi Osaka will face Jennifer Brady in the 2021 Australian Open final. The match gets underway at 9:30 pm NZT (2:30 am CT). If you want some pre-match reading, Karen Crouse previewed the match for The New York Times.
Feedback
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