Published: 2019
Genre: post-apocalyptic fiction
Length: 340 pages
Setting: L’Hotel Sixieme, Switzerland, present day
Summary: Short version: Jon documents events at the hotel after nuclear war
Long version: Nuclear bombs were dropped on many large cities around the world. The people staying at L’Hotel Sixieme have to decide what to do. While many leave, a core group of people stay. That includes Dr. Jon Keller, a historian. He decides to make a record of events at the hotel going forward and tells some of the inhabitants’ stories before arriving at the hotel. They find a dead girl in a water tank and Jon starts investigating who she was and how she got there. Everyone else questions his desire to solve the mystery. Eventually, they end up moving to the nearby town.
Final thoughts: Another “just fine” book. I never really got drawn into the story (unlike with Station Eleven). None of the characters felt sympathetic. That was probably because everyone was stressed out and worried the world was coming to an end. They were in a remote location and so cut-off from news. What if they were the only ones left? How were they going to survive the winter? Even with all the supplies of a big hotel and not too many people, they would run out. The people who started hoarding first were at a definite advantage. Relationships begin to break down in their small community, and then they find out there’s a perfectly functioning society in the nearby town. All that stress and worry could have been avoided if they had been willing to leave their little bit of sanctuary.
A central plot line is Jon’s questions about the dead girl they found. He can’t understand why no one else want to learn more about who she was or how she got there. I wasn’t satisfied with the answer to that mystery. Jameson seemed to set up a theme of everyone was meant to be where they were. An then there was the whole subplot of Jon having a toothache and refusing to get it looked at. Why at that to the story? I found it annoying detail.
Title comes from: The people at the hotel thought they might be the last ones alive
Reading challenges fulfilled: book #99 for 2020
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Miss Adventure had read this book and loved it. I was in the mood for some fantasy and this book was in the house. It’s the first book in the Crescent City series, just published this spring (so now I have to wait for the next books to come out).
This was provided by the Audiobook SYNC program for free this summer. I recognized the author and decided to listen.
This is the 16th book in the Dresden Files. It’s been six years since a book was published in the series. Of course I’m interested. I actually gave this to Mr. Curiosity and had to wait until he finished the book to read it. The best thing is book 17 is coming out at the end of this year. Two Dresden Files books in one year!!
This was a random book off my Kindle chosen in the hopes of not being too dark while on vacation. It was a free Tor book a few months back because there was a new book in the series published recently.
I put this on my radar because I saw it reviewed as an African Game of Thrones. Sign me up! It was in a small collection of books my library had for outdoor browsing so I picked it up.
This is the sixth book in the Dresden Files series.
I got an illustrated edition of this book for Christmas and decided it was high time to read it since the libraries are all closed due to the pandemic. It’s my third reread.
This is the first book in the Alexandria Quartet, a four novel series that is one of the top 100 books of the century.
This was a Tor free book that I picked randomly off my Kindle.