It turns out the novel is so interesting a reader might wish it were even longer than it is. Covering so many years, the novel is necessarily episodic, and some episodes are more interesting than others. Yet there is a continuing story here with continuing characters, and almost everything comes together in the dramatic climax.
Count Alexander Rostov could have been shot for the crime of being an aristocrat after the Russian Revolution. Instead he is moved into a small room in the Metropol Hotel in Moscow and forbidden to leave the hotel for the rest of his life.
Like Towles's earlier book, Rules of Civility, this is a novel of manners. Being a true gentleman, the count accepts his fate with grace and style. He makes the most of a bad situation and enjoys a full life, eventually becoming the head waiter at the hotel's fine restaurant, where Communist Party leaders often come to dine in a style they deny their countrymen.
Three female characters play significant roles in the count's life. One is Nina, a precocious nine-year-old girl when he first meets her. She also lives in the hotel and manages to turn him into a playmate. She teaches him the secrets of the hotel.
Anna is a beautiful actress who becomes his temporary lover whenever she stays at the Metropol.
The third is Sofia, Nina's tiny daughter left in the count's care while Nina goes off to Sibera in search of her imprisoned husband. She expects to be back in a matter of days, but she never returns, and he raises Sofia in his small room until she becomes a beautiful young woman and a gifted pianist.
If there was ever a "stranger comes to town" novel, it is this one. Yet in time it also becomes a "hero takes a journey" novel, and that journey alone is worth the price of owning this wonderful novel.
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