- Paperback: 288 pages
- Publisher: Mariner Books; 1 edition (Mar 4 1999)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0156006332
- ISBN-13: 978-0156006330
- Product Dimensions: 20.3 x 13.6 x 1.8 cm
- Shipping Weight: 295 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #578,159 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
|
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||
Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon
It calls itself a novel, but Finbar's Hotel is really more a collection of related short stories by novelists. Irish writer Dermot Bolger came up with the idea to invite six of his literary colleagues to collaborate on a tale about a decrepit Dublin Hotel on the eve of its demolition. In its prime, Finbar's was a glorious place; now, however, it's the haunt of prostitutes and thieves. A new owner plans to pull it down, but before he does, the seven authors (Bolger, Anne Enright, Joseph O'Connor, Roddy Doyle, Jennifer Johnston, Hugo Hamilton, and Colm Tóibín) imagine for it one last night. In "Benny Does Dublin" we meet Ben Winters, a fortysomething husband and father on the lam from his loving family for a single night. "He'd never been in a hotel room before. He wanted to see what staying in one was like. He was curious. All of these were right, honest answers. But why alone? Why so close to home?" "White Lies" introduces Rose and Ivy, two sisters united by love, divided by a painful secret. In "The Test" Maureen Connolly comes to Finbar's to hide from a broken heart and ends up mending it instead.
The serial novel has been tried before; what provides Finbar's Hotel with its twist is that none of the stories are signed. Bolger leaves it up to his readers to guess who's who. Those familiar with the work of these Irish novelists will enjoy the puzzle; others will still have these seven stories of love, despair, and redemption to relish. --Alix Wilber
From Publishers Weekly
The soon-to-be-demolished Dublin semi-landmark, the shabby Finbar's Hotel, is booked solid with seven of Ireland's most talented writers, each of whom tells a chapter of this ingeniously imagined novel. Readers familiar with the literary styles of Roddy Doyle, Colm Toibin, Jennifer Johnson, Hugo Hamilton, Joseph O'Connor, Anne Enright or Dermot Bolger will need to draw on their expertise to discern who wrote which episode, since no direct attribution is provided. Bolger (editor of The Vintage Book of Contemporary Irish Fiction) has masterminded this robust puzzle, and the hotel's very Irish atmosphere blooms with seven stories of nostalgia, humor and melancholy. There's a shaggy dog tale about a kidnapped cat in Room 103 and a hard-drinking Dublin man celebrating a mid-life crisis in 101 just across the hall from the already tense reunion of two sisters in 102. In 104 the night manager's reliving the hotel's shady history while confronting a guest who's checked in under an assumed name; and in 107 a paranoid art thief is worrying about how the woman next door might blow his hand off of a hot Rembrandt, while she in turn reminisces about her first love. One of the chief pleasures of this quirky book is encountering these characters from different perspectives as they intrude briefly into each other's stories. At its strongest points, the writers summon a deep sense of place, both historical and emotional. Not a conventional novel, clearly, yet the interlinked stories tenders more cumulative harmony than a conventional anthology; the heartening, garrulous Finbar's Hotel is a captivating place to check into.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
First Sentence
Ben Winters was looking for the minibar. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover
Ben Winters was looking for the minibar. Read the first page
Explore More
Concordance
Browse Sample PagesConcordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover
Tag this product(What's this?)Think of a tag as a keyword or label you consider is strongly related to this product.
Tags will help all customers organize and find favorite items. |
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most helpful customer reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
An experiment that works just fine,
By
This review is from: Finbar's Hotel: A Novel (Paperback)
What a hoot! Imagine an about-to-be-demolished venerable old Dublin hotel. Imagine hallways with room numbers on the doors. Imagine the interwoven lives of the people spending the night behind those doors.NOW: Imagine that 7 different Irish authors are each assigned a room number and told to write the stories, somehow collaborating so that the stories link loosely together as the characters meet - or don't - in the lobby, the lounge, the bar, the restaurant, whatever. And no credits are assigned to the chapters, i.e. we readers don't know which was written by, say, Roddy Doyle. So besides the book filled with stories, there's the added fun of trying to figure out who wrote what. Terrific.
3.0 out of 5 stars
A good 'novelty' book,
By jackaldrin@hotmail.com (Kent,UK) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Finbar's Hotel: A Novel (Paperback)
Basically each story begins with a character checking into a room. We get to observe them for a while and they eventually meet and interact with another character, then a kind of tension starts up. The initial characters don't really grab me with the exception of Maureen in The Test and Johnny in the Night Manager. These two are the stories I liked best. I also liked An Old Flame because it was intriguing, the way it unfolded was well written and it had a good ending. There are little incidents - a glimpse of another guest, an interaction with Simon the porter, or a party in the bar which all the stories refer to which link them together. I suspect these were put in later after the original story was written. It doesn't say which story is by which person, which is incredibly irritating! It meant I couldn't follow up the stories I liked. All in all I'd have to say this was a good 'novelty' book rather than a good collection of short stories I'd return to again and again.
3.0 out of 5 stars
A Concept That Doesn't Quite Make It,
This review is from: Finbar's Hotel: A Novel (Paperback)
After having heard a lot about this book, and read a number of reviews, I read this with much anticipation. I was sadly let down. While there is no denying the qualities of all the writers showcased, that is not to say that we see their best work here.While the linkages between the various stories are cleverly contrived, the writing is uneven. I found "Room 101 - Benny Does Dublin" far and away the best of the stories. That is not to say that this is a bad book, just that Bolger as editor hasn't quite pulled the concept off with this effort. Nevertheless, worth a look.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
Want to see more reviews on this item?
|
Most recent customer reviews |
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
