Hotel Babylon [Mass Market Paperback]

Imogen Edwards-Jones (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 7, 2004

The manager of an exclusive boutique hotel (who shall remain nameless) exposes the low-life styles of the rich and famous.

And we're not talking just loud all-night bashes...

The anonymous author has encountered lavish drug parties, gorgeous call girls, naked guests falling out of windows, $9,000 bottles of wine, astronomical telephone porn bills, bathtubs of Evian, and on more than one occasion, dead sheep. And every dirty word of it is true.

This is a trawl through the decadence and debauchery of the ultimate service industry—where money not only talks, but gets guests the best room, the best service, and also entitles them to behave in any way they please.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The anonymous author, who now manages an unnamed five-star hotel, has spent the past 15 years working in London's top lodgings. With British journalist Edwards-Jones, the author compresses these years into a 24-hour period (divided into one chapter for every hour) and places the events at a fictitious Hotel Babylon (to protect the guilty who may include the author). The result is an irreverent exposé of the often unimaginable debauchery and dishonesty of the luxury hotel industry. The insider's perspective affords honest assessments of the guests, workers and the hotel itself, revealing that "the scams are endless.... The suppliers do the hotel, the staff do the hotel and the hotel tries to do everyone." The man who can afford a £250 -per-night room but refuses to pay his 850-quid worth of calls to porn lines is despicable, but so is the hotel when it appends corkage fees for bottles never opened to unknowing wedding parties. In addition to including details of the rich and famous (Margaret Thatcher was "a great whiskey drinker"; Madonna complained "about the color of the curtains in her room"), the book shares odd "day-in-the-life of a front-desk receptionist" anecdotes (e.g., a naked lady singing in the lobby, a false fire alarm and the natural death of an old woman who lived at the hotel).
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Review

" 'Informative, disgusting and utterly fascinating' Closer. 'Reading Hotel Babylon is like mainlining Popbitch' Metro." --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 18 and up
  
• Mass Market Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Blue Hen Trade; First Printing edition (December 7, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 042520135X
• ISBN-13: 978-0425201350
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (28 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #512,659 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Highly amusing, October 28, 2005

By 

Gigi Fufu "gigi fufu" (Michigan) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hotel Babylon (Mass Market Paperback)

I was given this book from a friend who promised me, that as a frequent traveler, I may never feel the same way about my journeys after reading it. Boy was she right!

The novel moves very quickly and spans a 24 hour period in a five star hotel. Throughout the novel we are offered disturbing glimpses of what actually happens when people use a place as their home away from home. Believe me some of these glimpses are very distrubing!

The novel also demonstrates how hotels make money, how they deal with needy and demanding clients, what happens when they overbook and how they deal with some of the more "delicate situations" which arise.

Very fun and informative!

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A very funny read, December 28, 2004

By 

KatPanama "katpanama" (Readerville) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hotel Babylon (Mass Market Paperback)

Terrific plane reading. Facile but entertaining tale of the underbelly of a 5-Star luxury hotel in London. Funny and sometimes outrageous.

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars great stuff, December 1, 2004

By 

adam "frequent flier" (London) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hotel Babylon (Mass Market Paperback)

I really enjoyed this book. As someone who spends a lot of time travelling abroad and staying in five star hotels this is was a real eye-opener. The book is packed with great stories, anecdotes and loads of celebrity gossip and I found it hilarious, entertaining and the prefect thing to take on a long haul flight. I read it one sitting. I couldn't put it down. I liked the 24 hour format and I would recommend to anyone who is at all curious and who has a sense of humour.