Amor Towles's first novel, Rules of Civility, won readers' hearts with its strong sense of time and place, fully realized characters and richly evocative voice. A Gentleman in Moscow repeats the feat and more.
In 1922, Count Alexander Ilyich Rostov appears before a Bolshevik tribunal, accused of "succumbing irrevocably to the corruptions of his class." He responds with quips, and is sentenced to house arrest in the luxury hotel where he has lived for the last four years. "Make no mistake: should you ever set foot outside of the Metropol again, you will be shot." This stylish and cultured protagonist has already lost his family and its estate. Now he's moved from his suite into a monastic room of a hundred square feet. To brighten Rostov's days, a fellow resident, "the young girl with the penchant for yellow," befriends him. The hotel opens into a surprising and rewarding world--though, by decree, limited--as Rostov makes the best of his circumstances.
Readers who enjoy a generous, absorbing story, vibrant characters and immersive time and place will fall in love with this saucy novel. And by the time A Gentleman in Moscow closes in 1954, those readers will be sorry to lose the new friend they've found in Rostov. --Julia Jenkins, librarian and blogger at pagesofjulia