The Glass Hotel manages to achieve the impressive feat of being both intricate and exceedingly readable. I could hardly put it down and am looking forward to recommending it to patrons and friends! Many thanks for the opportunity to read and review.

Its hard for me to pick a main character or story line to point too. Vincent the bartender ends up with an ultra rich businessmen who turns out to be running a Ponzi scheme. Vincent's brother, her boss, various characters are effected in different ways. This a beautiful well written book. My favorite thing was the blending and cross overs between the various characters in their lives. There are sweet and also horrifying moments in each life.

Exquisite! I know this book will be on the BEST OF 2020 lists. It is a beautifully written novel which has succeeded in a place where others have been unsuccessful. Using the Madoff Ponzi scheme as inspiration, Mandel has woven a magical tale.

At the center is the strangely named Vincent who becomes involved with the mysterious man who echoes the story of Madoff’s rise and fall. There are ancillary characters but the author never allows the plot to get too crowded. She writes so vividly that I was able to visualize everything, in myriad settings.

From the Isolated West coast of Canada to the roiling ocean, I was powerfully drawn to this novel. I think it will be loved by book clubs, so much to discuss and think about. For those of us who lived through the Madoff debacle, there will be lots to remember and follow up.

Thank you Netgalley for this very special opportunity.

Emily St. John Mandel is an outstanding author. This book drew me in with it's complexities and ease.

Jonathan Alkaitis runs a Ponzi scheme. His story is the center of the spider web of interlocking stories with the people surrounding him. Even though he is the center, his girlfriend Vincent feels more like the main character. The book starts with her brother's story. He's a selfish, pathetic man and when the book jumps ahead in time, he's still a selfish, pathetic man. All of the characters don't change who their really are but they do adapt to their situations. This makes the world feel alive and realistic.

A beautiful, gorgeous read. I can't wait to share it with my loved ones.

I really enjoyed this one! Very creepy, with a good mystery to keep my interest hooked and characters I was engaged in. Definitely glad there were ghosts. That made it so much better.

Haunting, with many elements of a ghost story. Overall, I really enjoyed it because of how beautifully it is written. Out of all the characters whose lives are woven together, Vincent's story was by far the most interesting to me. I really enjoyed watching it unfold. This is a fabulous choice for book groups— especially those who enjoyed Station 11. Recommending this to readers who enjoy literary fiction we'll be a breeze.

After reading Station Eleven, I was thrilled to see a new title by Emily St. John Mandel, and I was not disappointed. While The Glass Hotel had a very different feel to it than her previous works, I really enjoyed the deep characterizations and strong sense of atmosphere. The nods to characters and situations in her previous works were also great, and added to the feeling of flexible boundaries of time and space that are present throughout this novel. Jumping around in time and space is not always my favorite structure, but it's handled well here and is never jarring. Overall, an excellent read, and I think fans of Station Eleven will thoroughly enjoy this novel.

Emily St. John Mandel is a wonderful writer who weaves beautiful stories. I tried not to compare this to Station Eleven which is truly one of my favorite books. It is certainly different and stands on its own. I will say I was a tad uninterested in the involved story line of a Ponzi scheme. I would have loved to spend more time with the main characters. Still a wonderful literary fiction read.

I first read Station Eleven, by Mandel with my local book club last year. I thoroughly enjoyed how she builds a story around devastation, destruction, and growth born out of necessity and survival. It is to this point, one of my favorite dystopian novels.

Once I heard she was releasing another novel, this time The Glass Hotel, I was extremely excited to dive into the exquisite world of Emily St. John Mandel’s writing style.

The Glass Hotel spends time building the exposition, allowing you as the reader to dive into the mind’s of each character present- Vincent, her brother Paul, Jonathan Alkaitis, Olivia- but once you’ve received a little sliver of each character (and you’re going to want to be patient, by the way!), the rest of the story: WHOA!

If you are someone that needs action on the first few pages, it is there, but be patient, and give this novel a chance. Her writing is stellar, as expected, and the storyline itself is so intriguing.

As suspected, the novel slowly burns through part one, introducing you to the main characters’ backstories in a seemingly haphazard [y’all know it is NEVER haphazard with authors like Emily St. John Mandel] landscape of puzzle pieces. By reaching page 200, you’ve effectively been transformed into a scandal of Bernie Madoff proportions, worthy of Olympic-style speed page turning sport.

As Vincent takes off her wedding ring, tossing it into the garbage, I was struck with Madel’s silent commentary on the scandal at hand. The flippancy with which the rich toss aside the hard work, the savings, the money of others impacted by a Madof style scandal, as if ti is an inconvenient truth best done away with as quickly as possible.

I appreciate Mandel’s effort towards basing her novels around real-life events that can impact us in the most horrific of ways [ a failure of systemic proportions, the loss of an entire life’s savings]. It makes her novels, while polar opposites, attractively connected to all of us as readers. I see this novel resonating VERY differently with each reader, depending on his/her age range, as well as personal memories of the Bernie Madoff scandal. If you aren’t versed on the topic, read a little of the former headlines; a living history is a must.

Emily St. John Mandel has a way of writing that feels like magic, before writing this review I looked back on my review of Station Eleven and noticed a piece of my review that I could have just as easily written for this book.

"Sometimes with books that have various intertwining storylines and characters I have trouble connecting to and truly caring about some or all of the characters. Either finding specific ones that I look forward to reading and others whose parts I find tedious, or finding all of them interesting in their own way but not really forming emotional attachments to any of them. This book was different, each of the characters that it spent time with felt like a real person to me, they were people I came to care for and people who seemed able to exist beyond the pages of a book."

It's like all of the characters belong to the same constellation, they're interconnected some more deeply than others, but they're also separate, individual, and living their own lives.

The story here is very different from Station Eleven, set before during and after the financial crash of 2007/2008, but more about tracking people's lives around it rather than the thing itself. And while this book is more rooted in reality rather than speculation, it has a similar dreamlike quality with something just beyond our ability to conceive of flickering at its edges.

I also really love the energy of the prose, it feels frenetic at times, but there is a masterful control to it so that just as you wonder if you've gone completely off topic you find yourself circling back to something from earlier that ties everything together beautifully. Storylines that might feel forced from a less skilled storyteller feel fluid and realistic here.

Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with an advanced copy, I loved this book and can't wait to share it with others.

I stayed up until midnight to finish this new novel of Emily St. John Mandel's and I would have it no other way! I would be surprised if someone possessed the self-control to draw out the reading of this one. It was compelling, amazing, and I loved it just as much as I loved Station Eleven. Perhaps more. But the two are different and I intend to share a longer review closer to the publication date. This is one of those books I'll be thinking about for a long time, and I'm certain I'll re-read it as well. The characters are so well-drawn--the thing about reading a book like this quickly is that it's sad to say goodbye to these characters that Mandel so expertly shared on the page. The focus on the Ponzi Scheme was incredibly fascinating--I don't think I can say enough wonderful things about this story, but I'll stop now and share more when the publication date is nearer! Thank you so much for the advanced copy!

*Thank you Knopf for the free copy!

A compelling read with a cast of fascinating characters and unique plot. The Glass Hotel is difficult to describe, but it mainly focuses on a group of individuals who are connected through a complicated financial scheme. A hotel located far from civilization serves as the impetus for their pivotal introductions to each other.

After reading the first few pages, I assumed this would be another book about individuals who make terrible choices, and I have to admit I wasn't excited to continue. As the other characters and more of the story unfolded though, I was hooked. Over time, a variety of people are introduced to Jonathan Alkaitis, who is running an exorbitant Ponzi scheme. A few become investors, one becomes his trophy wife, another eventually turns him in to the FBI.

Since the book jumps all over the place in time, as a reader you know the basics of what happens in the plot pretty quickly. Honestly, I didn't love this style and was a bit confused at times at where we were in the story. I think the writing and plot by themselves were fascinating enough that we didn't need to jump around. But that's the only reason I gave this 4 stars instead of 5.

My favorite character was Vincent, first introduced as a troubled teen, who later seizes the unique opportunities offered to her. She felt so real and did an admirable job dealing with the situations thrown at her.

As more details about the Ponzi scheme, its investors, and their lives after its collapse were revealed, I fell even more in love with the book. It's not a fast paced thriller or delightful romantic comedy, but an intriguing take on a very real con and the human reactions to it.

I really enjoyed the first half of the book and was drawn into the story and characters. The second half just seemed to drag and by the end, I had lost interest. The author used her writing technique of jumping from one timeline to another and from character to character as she did in Station Eleven. In this case, the story just wasn't as interesting.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for a digital review copy.

I loved Station Eleven. When I saw another book by Emily St. John Mandel on NetGalley, I just HAD to read it. Luckily I was approved. I read it in two days.
This book was completely different from Station Eleven but still had the same beautiful writing style. Great character development and sympathetic characters. I didn't think I was going to care about them as much as I did. Ms. St. John Mandel's descriptions of the hotel really brought it to life.
I have to see if there are more books by this wonderful author.

I thoroughly enjoyed ESJM's Station Eleven, but did not enjoy the structure of this book. Her writing is still ethereal and beautiful, but the construction of this novel was disorienting and did not flow for me. I won't be recommending it.

What can I say? This is a ghost story full of haunted memories and moments. But there is nothing paranormal here, only the mundane horrors of reality. The ghosts are not from the afterlife but from the counterlife. What could have been if only different choices had been made, unspoken words said, a different fate to follow for the various actors. This is a story rife with coincidence, distorted reflections, and mirrored experiences.

Jonathan Alkaitis is the wealthy financier whose actions lead to the downfall of everyone around him. Yet, most people around him have chosen to take the easy road and follow his lead unquestioningly. When his Ponzi scheme ultimately collapses, few escape it's reach unscathed. His (not quite) wife Vincent plays her role the best. Young, beautiful and always dutiful, she is the Betty Draper to Alkaitis' Mad Man persona. Unfulfilled and played to be more naive than she truly is, we see her progress from a grieving rebellious teen into the wide-eyed trophy wife and finally the self-possessed adventurer that she eventually becomes. In the end, her story may be the most tragic, yet somehow also the most fulfilling. Like her mother, she disappears mysteriously into the water at such a young age. However, Mandel writes this fate as somewhat of a happy ending, tying everything up full circle. In the end, Vincent has escaped her prison and in death is finally able to find peace.

Emily St. John Mandel's follow-up to the indomitable Station Eleven is also about the end of the world - rather than the macro world collapsing, The Glass Hotel looks at the lives of a small group of people as their personal worlds are destroyed. It is an intricately and delicately plotted story about the end of a Ponzi scheme, which touches the lives of every character in the book, and what happens to them after the con is over. I found The Glass Hotel to be a mesmerizing experience that I could not put down. It winds its way through the lives of several characters who intersect at the titular Hotel Caiette, creating a field of characters that are remarkable for how familiar they will feel. I knew almost nothing about this book before I read it, other than it was by Mandel, and I found it tremendous. The kind of book that sticks with you for long after.

Book Review

I HAD to get an advanced copy of this book from Netgalley because Station Eleven by Emily (I like to pretend we are on a first name basis) was my favorite book of the year when I discovered it in 2018, which is the year I read 95 books. The following is my honest opinion.

I do not want to give spoilers, so I’ll just say that the book maintains the same style of storytelling as Station Eleven. Almost lyrical and dreamy, but with realistic characters making major life decisions that keeps the story flowing. There are multilayered situations and characters, and you need to pay attention to everything because every detail seems to have weight. However, the story has nothing to do with the events of Station Eleven and is it’s own reality. (There is a mention of container ships again).

Station Eleven still edges out Glass Hotel as an instant classic, but Glass Hotel is still wonderful and engaging. A must read.

I loved this. The settings were varied and lush. The characters were interesting, yet distant from the readers-- you don't feel like you completely know any of them. The way this novel ends leads you to reread the first chapter again setting you up to continue a never-ending cycle of rereading. Also, somehow, Emily St. John Mendel managed to make me deeply interested in a book about economics (among many other things).

A captivating slow burn and a worthy follow up to Station Eleven. Emily St. John Mandel knows how to weave an intricate tale of epic proportions. The Glass Hotel shows how we are all just storytellers in the end; some of us just tell wilder tales than others.