Goodreads meta-data is 329 pages rated 3.7 by 323 litizens.
Genre: krimi
Verdict: Many trees, little forest.
Welcome to the back office of a very large and expensive hotel far away from the glitz and glamour of the lobby and the guest rooms. In back the floors are concrete, the paint is peeling, and the staff are treated like slaves. No it is not quite that bad, but the contrast between the front of the house and back is nonetheless stark. The laundry, the stains, the effort to please those paying a thousand dollars a night, the demands of the head of an association who brings its annual conference with hundreds of expense-account guests each year, the thefts, the health inspections, the demarcation disputes among the staff, the ego war in the kitchens, the indifference of the McKinsey-schooled managers to anything that does ring the cash register, they are all in a day and night at the Hotel California, which I identified with that rambling structure the Hotel del Coronado with its paper thin walls in San Diego where I once had a conference.
Our hapless protagonist has been passed over for promotion to manager more than once. Is that the cause or the effect of his increasingly cynicism? The incumbent manager, ever faithful to the book of McKinsey of delegating responsibility downward to maintain deniability, seems to take delight in heaping ever more duties on him, perhaps to drive him out. Well our hero is made of stronger stuff and will not buckle…yet.
With housing for nearly a thousand guests across several buildings and an endless stream of comings and goings it is a small town, and lots of shenanigans from mischief to murder, with a suicide in-between not to mention the nocturnal tepee creeping. (The description reminded me of the Hilton Village in Waikiki.) The police have learned to use the deliveries entrance. None of these events are good for business and the sooner swept under the carpet the better. Woe betide the housekeeping staff who lift that carpet.
There is slow build after an initial explosion of violence in a guest room, and much exposition of hotel mechanics along with a survey of the staff. That may sound laboured, however, it is well integrated into the unfolding of the narrative. Note, it is merciful shorn of IKEA descriptions of furnishings or Elle clothing fashions. Indeed I have no idea what the protagonist looks like.
However, yes there is a ‘but’ coming. The exposition does become forced when every room, every employee, every incident has a nickname or code name in hotelese which is explained. The tide of information is relentless. Time after time, page after page. It gets to be mechanical, Robbie. It became like following a jaded tour guide reciting facts and figures to no end. None of that exposition fed into the plot.
There are clever set-ups like the Bob Johnsons Convention which was a completely new idea to me, and it made a screwball comedy sort of Kurt Vonnegut sense. The solution wrapped-up just about everything, but not everything. Bob ‘Bull’ Johnson must still be roaming the hallways.
Oversold re laugh out loud but dryly amusing page-by-page. But perfect for bedside table reading matter.