Take a photo of a barcode or cover
A review by nonabgo
Hotelul Portofino by J.P. O'Connell
2.0
I need to create a new shelf of books whose purpose I don't understand. Because why, exactly, did I spend 12 hours listening to all this family and political drama only to get... nowhere? What is the point of everything if, in the end, things are in exactly the same place they were when the book began?
The only thing that this novel did for me is put Portofino on the list of places in Italy I want to see. It's - at least in part - atmospheric, sort of cozy in a summery way, good as beach read. A little bit of nature, the sea, the beach; a little bit of food, some limoncello on top. It made me miss Cinque Terre.
Everything else... was underwhelming. There's a lot of drama going on at the Portofino Hotel, a British enclave on the Mediterranean coast. Bella Ainsworth, the owner, is trying to keep the business alive, dealing with the increasingly growing expectations of her British clientele. Her marriage is on the rocks, due to her own indiscretions and her husband's dandy life and excessive spending. Her son, Lucian, is refusing to get a job, despite being an adult; he also has probably some PTSD from his life-threatening wound which he got in WWI. His parents are trying to arrange a marriage between him and a rich British girl, but he seems to prefer the servants. There's also a missing painting and some political unpleasantness caused by Mussolini's black shirts.
Everything has the making of a fun British soap-opera with Downton Abbey vibes and yet everything is just started and left unfinished. There are a lot of characters and plot lines (besides the "main" family drama, each guest at the hotel has their own - and there are many and diverse), but none which you can say is the red line, the focus. Something that would work well as a TV series (I understand there is one), but not so much as a one-and-done novel.
Because of this, many things are just thrown into the mix as "hooks", but not really explored. Such as Nish's sexual orientation (a bit of gay-baiting, let's throw some homosexuality into the mix because "we have to", but don't go anywhere with it), also Nish's involvement with the anti-fascist movement (just left in the air, nothing came out of it), the entire political context (it barely affected the story, it was just there to... what? make Bella give some bribes?), Constance's story (and how can she get away with not really working she she is supposed to), the tennis player's story, Alice's religious fanatism and love life, even Bella's affair... Many, many narrative threads, none of them resolved in any way, shape, or form. So, as I said in the beginning, there's no point to the book except to exist.
Too many characters, not enough characterization. And I had an "aha" moment when I finished the book and found out that the author is a man, because I could not understand how a woma6n could write some of the dialogue between women, which sounded artificial, plasticky.
To resume: beautiful cover, promising premise, lovely atmosphere. But too many characters and plot lines, none of them fully developed or concluded in any way. It felt exactly like watching a TV soap, that was poorly translated into a novel.
The only thing that this novel did for me is put Portofino on the list of places in Italy I want to see. It's - at least in part - atmospheric, sort of cozy in a summery way, good as beach read. A little bit of nature, the sea, the beach; a little bit of food, some limoncello on top. It made me miss Cinque Terre.
Everything else... was underwhelming. There's a lot of drama going on at the Portofino Hotel, a British enclave on the Mediterranean coast. Bella Ainsworth, the owner, is trying to keep the business alive, dealing with the increasingly growing expectations of her British clientele. Her marriage is on the rocks, due to her own indiscretions and her husband's dandy life and excessive spending. Her son, Lucian, is refusing to get a job, despite being an adult; he also has probably some PTSD from his life-threatening wound which he got in WWI. His parents are trying to arrange a marriage between him and a rich British girl, but he seems to prefer the servants. There's also a missing painting and some political unpleasantness caused by Mussolini's black shirts.
Everything has the making of a fun British soap-opera with Downton Abbey vibes and yet everything is just started and left unfinished. There are a lot of characters and plot lines (besides the "main" family drama, each guest at the hotel has their own - and there are many and diverse), but none which you can say is the red line, the focus. Something that would work well as a TV series (I understand there is one), but not so much as a one-and-done novel.
Because of this, many things are just thrown into the mix as "hooks", but not really explored. Such as Nish's sexual orientation (a bit of gay-baiting, let's throw some homosexuality into the mix because "we have to", but don't go anywhere with it), also Nish's involvement with the anti-fascist movement (just left in the air, nothing came out of it), the entire political context (it barely affected the story, it was just there to... what? make Bella give some bribes?), Constance's story (and how can she get away with not really working she she is supposed to), the tennis player's story, Alice's religious fanatism and love life, even Bella's affair... Many, many narrative threads, none of them resolved in any way, shape, or form. So, as I said in the beginning, there's no point to the book except to exist.
Too many characters, not enough characterization. And I had an "aha" moment when I finished the book and found out that the author is a man, because I could not understand how a woma6n could write some of the dialogue between women, which sounded artificial, plasticky.
To resume: beautiful cover, promising premise, lovely atmosphere. But too many characters and plot lines, none of them fully developed or concluded in any way. It felt exactly like watching a TV soap, that was poorly translated into a novel.