Customer Reviews

Private Hotel For Gentle Ladies (arc)

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I hate to put a damper on all the glowing reviews here but I personally did not see much humor while reading this book and certainly would not call it a fun read.

Charlotte Heath, the main character, was sick in bed for the last 10 months with what was either a form of polio, or a brain disease. The first time she felt well enough to venture outside the house, she found her husband Hays in the arms of another woman. Not knowing what else to do, or where to go she headed off to friends of hers in nearby Boston and they ended up taking her to a hotel where the former Heath cook, Mrs Petty was now working.

Once Charlotte arrived at the hotel, she found out that Mrs Petty wont speak to her and was shocked to find Aunt Lilly who happens to be her doctor and her husbands uncles wife.

As Charlotte stays on at the hotel, against eveyones better judgement, she meets a porter named Arthur and begins a sexual relationship with him while also trying to figure out why her husband might have been cheating on her and what she should do about it.

A Private Hotel for Gentle Ladies had a really interesting premise and from all the glowing reviews I figured this one would be a winner. What I ended up finding was a book that went around in circles only to have an ending that totally needed to be changed. The first chapter alone was all about the bells that should have been put on her sleigh so that her husband would have heard her coming before he leaned in to kiss the mystery woman.

I would not call this one of the worst books I ever read but all the other reviews make it seem like a must read. I obviously did not get the same reaction.

Okay, someone passed this book on to me because she said I don't read enough "fun things". I figured I'd make her happy by investing a day in this romance novel with a literary bent, but the fact is, it wasn't bad at all! In among its social statements was a funny fantasy about a woman from 1900, whose dream marriage to a wealthy Bostonian is smothering her to death, so in the face of her boredom, malaise, and anger over her husband's unfaithfulness, she emerges from a long confinement to undertake a stay at a certain hotel with a reputation for...um...making ladies very, VERY happy. The fact is, the impressively well-formed young male employees at the instiution make room service calls that include more than just breakfast, lunch and dinner. Though this is not an erotic book, and it is fairly well-composed, it is an interesting twist on the idea that in the past only men got to have fun in hotels of a certain sort. I was amused that I actually read this book (wow, don't I sound snobby) and I had to laugh at the fact I wanted to read it through to the conclusion in one sitting. Yeah, I really wanted to know how it ended! It's a pretty funny and charming tale that doesn't slide into fluffiness and delivers what its cover blurb promises. The ending could have been tweaked and it didn't need the developments that put a damper on the niceness of what the hotel had going on, but adversity is the grist of plot, I'm told. Three and seven-eights stars but heck let's round it to four.

I had such high hopes for this book, based on its description. And in spite of the author's sometimes hard-to-follow writing style - she does love to start in one place and wander quite far from the original subject before finally winding her way back - for the first few chapters I managed to hold on to those hopes.

But in the end, I would have to classify this book as 80 percent disappointment.

Charlotte is set up to be a very sympathetic character: Married to a man she loves, but trapped in the family home surrounded by a seemingly endless supply of in-laws (also all residents of the family home), none of whom have ever made much of an effort to make her feel a part of the family. Charlotte has been unable to bear a child to term in all the years of the marriage, and her 10 months in a sickbed seem to have put the final distance between her and her husband, Hays.

Finally, after an inexplicable recovery (the author never bothers to give any hint of why Charlotte is suddenly well after all this time), Charlotte is off to surprise her husband at the wake for one of his recently deceased uncles. But what she encounters is Hays and a mystery woman, just about to share a kiss.

Calling in a favor from the local baker and his wife, Charlotte finds herself at the hotel of the title, facing a chilly reception from Mrs. Petty - the former cook in Charlotte's in-law's house - who had been the one to first tell Charlotte about the hotel. (Though not about the details of what goes on there.)

To this point, the book was enjoyable. But once Charlotte lands in the hotel, the book heads into a decline from which it never recovers.

The efforts of the hotel's owner, his staff and Charlotte's Aunt Lily - a surprise "regular" at the hotel - to get Charlotte out of the hotel were understandable, if a little tedious. Arthur's attachment to Charlotte is pretty sudden, and regardless of how she feels about Hays' cheating on her, it seems a little odd that she would embark on an affair with Arthur quite so easily.

And unless the author is planning a sequel, there were things in this book that just didn't seem to have a reason for being. Charlotte's introduction to the hotel owner's wife and her servant, for example. An interesting enough scene, but to what purpose?

The artist who created all the paintings in the hotel - introduced, then killed off.

Mrs. Petty and her children - suddenly packed off to another situation, for the good of the children. Sure, we learn who the father of one of the children is, but again - why?

Charlotte's parents, who have been conspicuously absent from Charlotte's thoughts for a good portion of the book - there's no purpose to their appearance at the end, nor really to Charlotte's search for them.

The ending, as mentioned by another reviewer, is the worst part of the book. Why does Charlotte do what she does when she leaves the hotel? Is it guilt, a desire for reconciliation?

Charlotte frustrates me...I don't know what she wants, and most of the time she doesn't seem to know, either. In the end, I didn't care much about this book, except to wonder about the several chapters that seemed to have been lopped off the end. Maybe they would have wrapped things up in a better fashion.

I won't read this book again, and I certainly can't recommend it to others.

Charlotte leaves her sick bed for the first time in a year only to see her husband kissing another woman. Since this is only 1900 and there aren't many choices for a woman, she decides to take a break from her comfortable but stifling marriage and sets up housekeeping in Boston at The Beechmont, which turns out to be a male brothel in which handsome porters make discreet visits to the establishment's female clientele. There is a curious cast of characters, but they are too shallowly drawn to get a good liking for any of them. This book just rambles too much for my taste. It doesn't get interesting until well past page 100.

I decided to read this because of the recommendation by author Julia Glass (she wrote Three Junes).

I agree with others that the writing is superb, particularly in the first few chapters. The author paints a fascinating picture of what life is like in the early 20th centurty. I found that to be the most engaging part of the story.

As the book drags on, there are many unanswered questions. For instance -- who was the woman that Hays was stooping to kiss at the beginning of the book? Characters come and go and contribute little to the story, the "gratifying surprise" at the end as intimated by Julia Glass, is hardly gratifying and not much of a surprise. Should we really care that much about the situation between Arthur and Eunice? We barely know anything of Eunice until the "surprise".

After a somewhat lyrical & intriguing start this story simply tanked. What happened? Who knows because it degenerated into a silly muddle that was a total waste of my time. Will I ever get those hours back? I don't think so. The one star is for the premise, the missing four stars are for all the lost promise. A Private Hotel would have made a great short story, it was about 150 pages too long.

I kept on plowing through this book because I was sure it would get better, but it never did. It reminds me of a really well-made film--you can admire its artistic merit, but it's no fun at all to watch.

Former invalid Charlotte Heath runs away from home when she finds her husband with another woman. She seeks and finds refuge in a most unusual hotel in Boston --- a reverse brothel. There she eventually comes to terms with what it is she really wants out of life.

The story begins in the early twentieth century at the Heath estate, which is located near Boston. The Heaths are a wealthy and very-well connected family, and they all reside in one huge compound. Charlotte, who came from an impoverished background, finds this family togetherness stifling at times, especially since her husband Hays often seems to prefer the company of his family over spending time alone with her. Hays is very controlling and is always watching Charlotte as though he doesn't quite approve of her. Charlotte continually feels that she doesn't measure up to the Heaths' expectations.

Then Charlotte contracts polio and is quickly and conveniently whisked away, out of sight, to a sickroom that further isolates her from Hays, the Heaths, and the outside world. She spends most of a year bedridden. During that long confinement Charlotte learns to be very still and wait, though she is uncertain just what it is she expects to occur. Mostly, she imagines what might be going on in the outside world. She has a rather peculiar imagination and often imagines events from two completely different perspectives as though she can't really make up her mind which one might be correct.

Once she has recuperated from nearly a year in her sickbed, she is out one brisk, snowy day with her buggy and favorite team of horses. She accidentally spots Hays across the street having a rather intimate, stolen moment with a strange woman. Charlotte is bewildered and upset. Determined not to return to the confines of the Heath estate or to her husband, whom she believes has betrayed her, she literally runs away to a hotel in Boston she had heard of from the family cook who sometimes worked there. Charlotte knew the name of the hotel but not its secrets.

The Beechmont is a classy Boston hotel with a definite aura of secrecy about it. The staff is sworn to silence so the guests can enjoy their much-sought after privacy. Besides the maids and a rather eccentric doorman, most of the rest of the "staff" are handsome young men who entertain the Beechmont guests according to the whims and pleasures of those guests.

Charlotte becomes acquainted with a few of the hotel residents and is quite surprised that the doctor, Hays's aunt, who treated Charlotte during her period of confinement, is actually a regular guest at the Beechmont. Aunt Lily promises to keep Charlotte's whereabouts a secret. Charlotte meets a few of the "staff" and comes to know one of the young men, a medical student who is working his way through college at The Beechmont, rather intimately. She also gets involved in the personal lives of some of the peculiar occupants of the hotel.

There is a detective-type outside, across the street, watching the hotel and the comings and goings of its staff and occupants. The detective, Dickie, is someone Charlotte previously knew. Dickie is now in the employ of Boston Society for the Suppression & Prevention of Vice. The members of the Society know there's something odd going on inside The Beechmont, but proving it is an altogether different matter.

The early twentieth-century setting of a very proper-seeming Boston hotel provides the perfect stage for this story to play out. Charlotte's many musings and deliberations will keep the reader guessing just how this most unusual tale will end.


--- Reviewed by Carole Turner

In late winter I had the chance to hear author Ellen Cooney read excerpts from her latest book, A Private Hotel for Gentle Ladies.I was instantly transported into the world of Charlotte Heath and turn of the century Boston. To me, a good novel does just that, takes me away from the day to day humdrum, into another place.

Heroine Charlotte left her philandering husband, after she recovered from a year long illness. She checked into a "reverse brothel", where the women guests get more than a mint on the pillow with the bedtime turn down service.

I could natter on, but a few important things. Ms. Cooney's reading was fabulous. She breathed life into her quirky and beautifully drawn characters. I loved the way she shared the characters' thoughts, giving me an inside view and insight into their beings. Her question and answers after the reading conveyed a down home demeanor and also an unbelievable brilliance. Her personna is like her characters-witty, smart, reflective, self knowing, gracious. She is a natural and gifted teacher. Don't miss Ellen Cooney the next time she comes to a local book store to read.

I liked that Ms. Cooney's latest work left me pondering. I am not sure her aim was social commentary, but more to tell a good story. I identified with Charlotte. Who hasn't, after being betrayed, tried to come to terms with and try to understand what led up to a relationship ending? But also, I wonder, how different are the women of the 21st century from Charlotte? Some 30 years after the women's movement, are women more free or more bound and limited by the expectations of others? At any rate, do read A Private Hotel for Gentle Ladies, Ellen Cooney's best so far.

I was very excited to read this book after reading all of the great reviews I was expecting a funny and enlightening read about an early 1900's reverse brothel. The premise has the makings for a truly fantastic book. Yet, although it was an easy read and the prose was done well, it was...well, boring.

'A PRIVATE HOTEL FOR GENTLE LADIES' centers around Charlotte Heath who just off of her sick bed discovers that her husband is having an affair. At a loss as for to what to do next Charlotte decides to take an extended holiday to visit her only friend, an ex-servant for the very wealthy Heath family. Unbeknownst to Charlotte this ex-servant is now working in a very private hotel where the guests are only women and the men that one may see wondering the halls at night get paid by the hour for their "services". Here Charlotte explores her marriage, herself, her family and what it means to be a true friend.

There was very little humor, that I found, in this novel. Where it could have been full of colorful and fun characters it was actually dull and the quirky characters were never fully explored. Also, I found the story to be extremely one sided in making the main character Charlotte's husband look like the bad guy when clearly the decline of their marriage was the fault of both of parties. I give this story three stars because it did pick up the pace a bit at the end and I was happy with the resolution but overall this was a below average read.