I seem to be in the minority with regards to this review, I have seen nothing but praise for how much other readers loved this book! I also haven't read Station Eleven by Emily St John Mandel so I don't really have any experience with her writing.

The Glass Hotel mainly follows Vincent and her brother Paul. They are both working at a Glass Hotel by the name of Caiette on Vancouver island, its a five star resort that appeals to the rich and famous for its remoteness. One day a message is scrawled on the Glass in acid marker ' Why don't you eat Glass' it was meant for the owner Johnathan Alkaltis but was seen by a shipping expert instead.
During this time Vincent and Alkatis share a drink and get to know each other more intimately during this time we come across characters that have invested in Johnathan's ponzi scheme and how all their lives interweave.

I have to say, I was disappointed with this book. It was boring, the characters were boring.... there was no real plot and it took too long to get the point. The writing style was good but it just took me ages to read this as I just wasn't invested in the characters or anything going on. It just felt like a big jumble of lives.

This book has put me off of reading Station Eleven now.

An intricately woven tale.

This was my first read from Emily St John Mandel and she has beautifully written an intricately woven tale, which mainly centres around four main characters... Vincent (female), her half-brother Paul, Jonathan Alkaitis, and Leon Prevant.

Although all the characters are fictional, there is a huge parallel with the massive financial crisis of 2008. The setting moves in several areas of America, especially in New York and in Canada. At one point further on, we are taken to other destinations, via one character’s sailing experiences.

As the plot unfolds, we are taken back and forth in time, plus meeting numerous other characters and how they become enmeshed in an extremely immoral lifestyle, all because of their link to Jonathan Alkaitis, who owns The Glass Hotel.

Many issues are explored including mega-rich lifestyles, corruption, seizing unlawful opportunities, drug addiction, lies and deceit!

I particularly enjoyed unravelling the stories and fates of all the characters, but I personally found there was far too much depth revolving around the 2008 crash.

Galadriel.

Elite Reviewing Group received a copy of the book to review.

The Glass Hotel - Emily St John Mandel

From the award-winning author of Station Eleven, a captivating novel of money, beauty, white-collar crime, ghosts, and moral compromise in which a woman disappears from a container ship off the coast of Mauritania and a massive Ponzi scheme implodes in New York, dragging countless fortunes with it.
Vincent is a bartender at the Hotel Caiette, a five-star glass and cedar palace on an island in British Columbia. Jonathan Alkaitis works in finance and owns the hotel. When he passes Vincent his card with a tip, it's the beginning of their life together. That same day, Vincent's half-brother, Paul, scrawls a note on the windowed wall of the hotel: "Why don't you swallow broken glass." Leon Prevant, a shipping executive for a company called Neptune-Avramidis, sees the note from the hotel bar and is shaken to his core. Thirteen years later Vincent mysteriously disappears from the deck of a Neptune-Avramidis ship. Weaving together the lives of these characters, The Glass Hotel moves between the ship, the skyscrapers of Manhattan, and the wilderness of northern Vancouver Island, painting a breathtaking picture of greed and guilt, fantasy and delusion, art and the ghosts of our pasts.

Remember my massive list of ARCS? This is one of the many books that was on there.
I absolutely adored Station Eleven, which is why I requested this, but much like Station Eleven, I adored this too. The thing is, again, like Station Eleven, I have no idea how to explain this book to people.

I feel like whatever I say when it comes to The Glass Hotel won't do it justice. It is a thriller of sorts, but the kind of thriller only someone with Emily St John Mandel's level of skill can write. I've only read two of her books so far, but I can tell you that both of them are brilliantly constructed. The narration is incredible and the characters are so well rounded and fascinating that you can't help but get the very premise of her story stuck under your skin.

Like with Station Eleven, The Glass Hotel follows several different strands, all of which come together at the aforementioned Glass Hotel in an incredibly atmospheric and beautiful way. How everything linked together took my breath away, and I found my brain actively making all these little connections while I was reading, but in a way that complimented the story rather than took me out of it. I think this is one of those books that is best experienced with as little prior knowledge as possible, so all I will say is that this is one of my favourite books of 2020, I loved it, I want you all to read and love it even if I can't quite articulate why...

Emily St John Mandel is a phenomenal writer in my opinion, so I was excited to read this- and I wasn’t disappointed. The descriptions of different locations and the characters gave the novel such a rich background, I felt like I had visited the places and met the people! I loved the focus on the ocean, on water, and on relationships and what binds us together. A brilliant book that will stay with me forever.

Vincent is a bartender at the Hotel Caiette, a five-star glass and cedar palace on an island in British Columbia. Jonathan Alkaitis works in finance and owns the hotel. When he passes Vincent his card with a tip, it’s the beginning of their life together. That same day, Vincent’s half-brother, Paul, scrawls a note on the windowed wall of the hotel: “Why don’t you swallow broken glass.” Leon Prevant, a shipping executive for a company called Neptune-Avramidis, sees the note from the hotel bar and is shaken to his core. Thirteen years later Vincent mysteriously disappears from the deck of a Neptune-Avramidis ship. Weaving together the lives of these characters, The Glass Hotel moves between the ship, the skyscrapers of Manhattan, and the wilderness of northern Vancouver Island, painting a breathtaking picture of greed and guilt, fantasy and delusion, art and the ghosts of our pasts.

The above is the blurb of The Glass Hotel taken from Goodreads. Normally I write my own blurbs, but this novel, as with other works of Mandel, is so far reaching that it felt a daunting task to try and encompass the breadth of the plot in a few lines.

The thing I’ve found with Mandel’s books, particularly this one and Station Eleven, is that you think the story is about one thing. And yet it turns out to be so much more. And somehow, she manages to cram whole lifetimes into her novels, but it’s never unnecessary details about characters, or wiffle which I feel could be cut out. Every word I read makes me sink deeper into the world she has created and know these characters like they were people I know in real life.

To expand on the plot, we start with Paul, a college drop out who struggles with a drug addiction. He goes home to visit his half sister Vincent, who is suspended from school from graffitiing a school window with an acid marker. That visit ends badly and we skip a few years until we find both Paul and Vincent working in the secluded Hotel Caiette, only accessible by boat, until another graffiti experience ends both their times there, and they diverge again. We follow Vincent as she lives with Jonathan Alkaitis, the owner and frequent guest of the Hotel Caiette, married but not married, living a dependant life she’s not used to. We learn about Jonathan’s business, in investment, until he ends up in jail and Vincent ends up on a shipping freighter from which she mysteriously vanishes from.

There is a large cast of characters, from Paul, Vincent, her school friend Mirella, Leon Prevant, a shipping expert and hotel guest, Walter and Raphael who work at the hotel, Miranda who I’m sure is a call back to Station Eleven, Olivia, Harvey, Oskar, Joelle, Enrico, and yet we know so much about each individual character.

Mandel has a way of drawing you into a novel and keeping you there. There’s not a boat load of action, and sometimes there’s a lot of business and investment/finance lingo I wasn’t following, but it doesn’t matter. The story is still followable, it’s only brief, and I’m too hooked anyway to let it affect me. The whole story is like that – if you’re not clicking with one particular character, she soon diverts off to another one, and another, all while leaving you wondering what happens to the ones we left behind. Don’t worry though, she always follows up.

I just cannot fathom the amount of work and planning and talent that goes into writing a novel of this depth and scope. I was 100% in from the very beginning, and she never lost me, even for a second. I was so deep into this world of The Glass Hotel that now that I’m finished I miss reading it, I want to know more about these characters, I need to be in this world again.

I will be thinking about this book for a long time to come. 100% recommend. 4 and a half stars

This was good - very good, really - but I think my expectations were set a little too high after Station Eleven. The multiple plots were a little too much here, where there they worked so well. I wasn't too keen on the small elements of magical realism either. However! The characters were wonderful, still, and I'll continue to read everything Emily St John Mandel writes.

The Glass Hotel follows Paul and Vincent, brother and half sister, from their time as teenagers through to adulthood. Vincent and Paul didn’t have the easiest teenage years. Vincent lost her mother, and suffered from years of resentment from Paul for the collapse of his parent’s marriage. Both find themselves back living and working together at the Hotel Caiette as adults and this is where the drama really begins.

A calculated event pulls the siblings apart and their lives take very different paths. Vincent finds herself in a complicated relationship, whereas Paul takes a new path in his career. The recession hits and Emily St John Mandel brings the full impact of this to her characters. Lives are changed irreversibly by the hotel owner’s deception, and each are left to pick up the pieces as a result. Vincent’s partner, an old friend of his, and his employees all being different perspectives to the central story.

Although the book begins as Paul’s story, I really felt this book was owned by Vincent. She shone through as a strong and determined woman who would not let her past drag her down. She was looking for a purpose in life, and I wonder if she was ever really satisfied with how things turned out. I was also absorbed by the perspective of the hotel owner and his fate at the end. I felt the psychological impact of what he had done was explored in more detail than I would have expected, and this gave a satisfying, open ended conclusion.

One theme throughout the book is a re-telling fo the story after the fact, intertwined with extracts from the times themselves. This jumping through time to show different perspectives is seamless and adds depth to the story. The plot itself isn’t complex, but the way the reader is taken from character to character at various points makes the book feel like so much more than a combination of each individual thread.

The Glass Hotel is on Vancouver Island, only accessible by boat. A luxury 5 star hotel owned by Jonathon Alkatis who works in finance.

This novel moves from an obscure hotel on the north coast of Vancouver Island to New York to a container ship off the coast of Mauritius, and is about siblings, the world of money, ponzi schemes, ghosts and counterlives for all the regrets in a life.

Now, you might think that a novel which is largely about the Ponzi scheme is not going to be interesting. Well, honestly, it turns out that a good author can use such a subject as the 2008 financial crisis and the collapse of a ponzi scheme as something to explore in many different ways. Different stories converge to highlight a world in peril.

Thank you Netgalley for the ARC. I found The Glass Hotel highly enjoyable, a good, short read focussing mainly on the lives of some individuals as they face certain impacts of the 2008 financial crisis (Bernie Maddofs spirit resonates throughout), but mainly the meaning of finding purpose in life. The novel doesn’t hit the heights that Ms Mandel’s debut Station Eleven hits (a great read, which resonates more strongly now in the current pandemic environment), but still good enough to give it a go. 4 out of 5 stars

“What does it mean to be a ghost, let alone to be there, or here? There are so many ways to haunt a person, or a life”

Trying to start this review in a way that doesn't mention Station Eleven (and my unending love for that book) proved to be impossible, especially given how relevant a novel about a global pandemic suddenly is in 2020, just as her new book is hitting the shelves. That book (along with Last Night in Montreal, which I also enjoyed) was the reason I was so excited to read this new offering from Emily St. John Mandel.

Her previous style is sprinkled throughout, the most obvious indicator being multiple narratives, spread throughout various timelines, knitting together throughout the book. However, it took until a few chapters in for a passage to hit me as a truly signature Emily St. John Mandel piece of writing – a character describing how he views the global shipping network. Trust me on this, it may sound like a dull topic but it shows Mandel's poetic way of describing global networks, in this case "each one as a point of light, converging into rivers of electric brilliance over the night oceans".

That character appears as an Easter egg that actually does link this book to Station Eleven. Leon Prevant and his assistant Miranda both appear, not as major characters but not just in passing either. This connection is not important in the grand scheme of things, but does leave readers of both books wondering about the connection between these vastly different stories that cannot take place in the same timeline. There is, however, one brief throwaway moment – one of several imagining alternative timelines, realities, or universes – which suggests the possibility that the flu pandemic of Station Eleven was an imagined timeline in the mind of one of the characters of The Glass Hotel.

Anyway, enough about Station Eleven, because this book really has nothing to do with it. Although also being about a global catastrophe, it is a totally different story – capturing the zeitgeist of a world struggling through the 2008 financial crisis. A story about the collapse of a fraudulent financial scheme may not sound like the most appealing thing to many readers, but Mandel's artful way of crafting the journey through the narrative makes it worth exploring.

This is a story about corruption, and how easily lead into it people are. This is a story about different lives led. This is a story about knowing something but choosing not to know. And this is also, surprisingly, a story about ghosts.

Vincent is the most fascinating character; she is a chameleon living several different lives up until the moment she falls from the deck of a ship into the ocean below – a moment that the book opens with. The reader is then transported back through time to learn about the events that lead to this moment.

While working at Hotel Caiette, Vincent has chance meeting with Jonathan Alkaitis that throws her into the "kingdom of money" (one of several descriptions of different countries or kingdoms that people within the same country can experience, along with the "country of the sick" and the "shadow country") up until Alkaitis's downfall, brought about by the financial crisis putting an end to his Ponzi scheme.

Other timelines we follow include those of Vincent's half-brother Paul, her boss at the hotel Walter, Alkaitis himself, several of his investors, and a nameless employee who worked on the corrupt side of his business. Almost all of these characters are at the very least morally questionable, but through their eyes the reader experiences at least some empathy for the majority of them.

I do feel like something was missing from the story, particularly towards the end. A climax, maybe. Perhaps, although not a technique particularly used in Mandel's past works, it is a twist or a reveal that is missing. Perhaps it just needed a "big moment". As it stands, while the ending does feel connected to the overall story, I'm not necessarily sure how much I agree that the overall story connects to the ending.

Rating: somewhere between 3.5 and 4 stars.

4.5 rounded down

Having struggled with Station Eleven (I know, I know!) I was intrigued but anxious to pick this up. Ghosts and Ponzi schemes are not themes which would normally having me waxing lyrical over a novel, but here we are: in Emily St. John Mandel's capable hands these made for a fantastic plot for a story.

Set from the 60s to the 20s - that's the 2020s - The Glass Hotel Mandel introduces us to a whole host of different characters across different locations and timelines (don't worry, it doesn't get too confusing) who are all linked to the aforementioned Ponzi scheme in some way. The novel primarily focuses on Vincent, a young woman who we meet when she's working as a bartender at the Hotel Caiette, and Jonathan Alkaitis, owner of the hotel and the man responsible for the Ponzi scheme. Their lives diverge, and the story develops from there into something epic and unlike anything else I've ever read.

This has been described variously as a financial thriller, a ghost story and a family saga, but it's really quite unique. On top of this, Mandel's writing is fantastic, and I'll be shocked if this isn't on at least some of the prize lists this year.

I loved the author's earlier book, Station Eleven, and was excited to receive an ARC of this new book. The Glass Hotel is a very different book and I must admit that I found it took a little bit of getting in to at first,. But it is an extremely atmospheric and imaginative read that really draws you in. and I would certainly recommend it to other readers.

I went into The Glass Hotel knowing very little of what to expect, and I think that's the way to read this story. It is an intricate story of human connections with an almost dream-like quality about it. The story is made up of so many different threads that weave together, sometimes when you least expect it. A beautiful mix of big picture and fine detail, all at once.

As much as I loved Station Eleven, I simply couldn't warm to The Glass Hotel. The writing was superb, as I would expect, and possibly this was the sole reason I pressed on with it when my interest waned.

The characters were well imagined and beautifully sketched, warts and all, but the story just left me cold. So much of this novel was about Jonathon's dealings and the characters wrapped inextricably with that world. I didn't like any of them and felt no sympathy. Vincent, though, was a character that kept me hanging on. She was a mystery and what happened with her saw me through to the end. A befuddling end but the end, nonetheless.

Vaya por delante, antes de entrar en materia con The Glass Hotel, que no leí la anterior novela de Emily St. John Mandel, Estación Once (Kailas editorial, 2016). Tampoco ninguna de las anteriores, aun sin traducir al castellano, por lo que esta es mi primera lectura por parte de la novelista canadiense. Recalco este detalle porque, según he podido leer en otros comentarios sobre esta obra, hay ciertos personajes que aparecen en esta novela que provienen de Estación Once. Esto sugiere una especie de universo literario conectado pero lo suficientemente independiente como para que no suponga un problema para quien se acerque por primera vez a sus novelas. Algo parecido a lo que hace David Mitchell, vaya.

The Glass Hotel empieza y acaba de la misma manera: Vincent, una de las protagonistas, desaparece del barco en el que se había enrolado huyendo de toda su vida anterior. ¿Qué vida era esa? Buena parte de la novela trata precisamente de cómo Vincent y el resto de personajes forman parte de un completo entramado del que, cuando explota, deben huir de la manera que puedan.

El hotel de cristal que da título a la novela es un edificio de lujo mayormente transparente situado en una isla de la Columbia británica, al oeste de Canadá. Llegar a esta isla únicamente es posible por vía marítima. Allí trabajan tanto Vincent como su hermano Paul. Una noche, aparece un extraño mensaje en uno de los cristales del edificio. Mientras las pistas apuntan directamente al hermano de Vincent como el autor de la frase, ella y el dueño del hotel, Jonathan Alkaitis, comienzan una relación que no terminara aquí.

Un concepto con el que merece la pena familiarizarse a la hora de leer la novela, y cuya denominación no conocía (aunque sí la idea) es el del Esquema Ponzi. El Esquema Ponzi es una operación fraudulenta de inversión que implica abonar a los inversores actuales los intereses obtenidos del dinero de nuevos inversores, quedándote el beneficio original en tu bolsillo. Este sistema piramidal, desgraciadamente conocido por la crisis económica que desde 2008 nos afecta a todos en mayor o menor medida, es una parte importante de esta novela.

En este punto de la reseña ya he mencionado el barco de donde desaparece Vincent, el hotel de cristal donde da inicio la historia cronológicamente y el esquema Ponzi cuyo entendimiento ayuda a entender algunos de los eventos de la novela. The Glass Hotel es, en su mayor parte, la historia de todos estos personajes (Vincent, Paul, Jonathan) más algunos secundarios, creando una vida en Manhattan a partir de los beneficios de este engaño. La historia viaja de atrás hacia delante, desde inicio de los años 90 hasta casi el 2030, contándonos como estos personajes montan una vida fuera de los normal, una vida irreal y paralela a lo que sucede fuera de los despachos donde se planean los engaños.

Uno de los aspectos más interesantes de la novela es cómo Emily St. John Mandel juega con sus personajes y las realidades alternativas. El hecho de que personajes como Vincent o Jonathan tomen unas decisiones a sabiendas de que están realizando algo ilegal y que tendrá consecuencias provocan que ellos mismos se pregunten constantemente por qué pasaría si no tomasen esas decisiones. Para ello imaginan vidas paralelas cuyo árbol de decisiones ha sido distinto y donde aparecen personajes que no tendrían por qué estar ahí. A veces esas vidas paralelas resultan tan realistas que confunden no solo al personaje sino al propio lector.

Sin embargo, a pesar de todo lo dicho, finalmente he tenido la sensación de que me ha faltado algo más para poder recomendar The Glass Hotel sin ninguna duda. El hecho de que el propio hotel de cristal que conocemos al inicio de la novela y que esporádicamente ira apareciendo en la trama no sea aprovechado en mayor medida me ha resultado algo decepcionante. Al final de la novela me ha quedado la sensación de que todo se sustenta en el Esquema Ponzi y las consecuencias legales y morales de llevarlo a cabo, con unos personajes que se ven enrocados en una trama financiera de la que no pueden salir y, quien lo consigue, tampoco consigue retomar una vida normal.

The Glass Hotel es, sin duda, una novela maravillosamente escrita. Las páginas caen casi sin darnos cuenta. Es una pena que las expectativas que la propia obra va creando no terminen por concretarse en un argumento que, por estructura y elementos, podría tener una profundidad mayor pero que se queda en un plano intermedio que me ha dejado algo frio.

I really loved Station 11 when I read it a while back - not that I recommend you read that just now for obvious reasons - so I was quite excited to get my hand on this book.
Boy does this have a bit of everything and it delivers in a rather unique way. Flitting about in time we follow the characters over many years as they live their lives both separately and together in a story that defies genre and encapsulates all that is both good and bad in the world.
It's hard to say much about the story as it is all a bit interconnected and to touch on much more than is given away in the blurb would probably inject spoilers and that's just not done.
The central character is Vincent who meets investment manager Jonathan Alkaitis in his hotel where she is working as a bar tender. They team up and she enjoys the rich lifestyle she has gained. Little does she know that he isn't quite all above board in his dealings. We also meet her half brother Paul who has his own challenges in life. The two of them flit in and out of each others lives throughout the book. Then there's Leon Prevant, shipping exec, quite how he fits into things isn't immediately obvious... There's the before and the after. The event separating the two being the financial crisis when Alkaitis' nefarious deeds are exposed. There's build up and fallout.
It's an addictive story. I found that once I had fully immersed myself into the writing I was unable to put it down for all but the necessary. It also kept my attention nicely and gave me an escape from life which, believe me, is a necessary thing at the present. It made me think, kept me guessing, had me wondering where we were going all the way through. All delivered in an often poetic way. We also touch on what one character calls "the counterlife", an alternative reality played out in imagination as a coping strategy. Something I recall doing myself in times of trouble.
Characterisation is what really sets this book apart from others. Each one gave something unique to the story being told. Each had their part to play and did it well. Each was fully crafted and easy to connect to in some way. Interaction between them felt natural and, as such, they all felt real.
There are a few surprises along the way but nothing that feels like the author relies on such things to make her book stand out. Instead, we have quality writing all the way through. Telling a story in the old fashioned way, relying on all the things that need to make a good book a great read rather than compromising anything which is something I found quite refreshing.
My thanks go to the Publisher and Netgalley for the chance to read this book.

I've heard wonderful things about this author and couldn't wait to read this.

The Glass Hotel is on Vancouver Island, only accessible by boat. A luxury 5 star hotel owned by the magnanimous Jonathon Alkatis. When Jonathon passes a card with his tip to Vincent the bartender it’s a new beginning.

Then you jump to 13 years later, when Vincent disappears off the deck of the Neptune - Avramidis ship. Was it an accident or deliberate?

This book in set in alternative timelines and flits around leaving you with an eerie send of mystery.

Beautifully written and very addictive. Fascinating read.

Will definitely read Station Eleven!!

I am so sad that I didn't like this one. It makes me start to think that perhaps 'Station Eleven' and 'Last Night In Montreal' were little flukes for me? Perhaps there are only certain works from this author that I'm really going to enjoy - and this just wasn't one of them. My main issue is that I can only feel like an idiot while reading a book for so long. I want to know at least fifty pages in what the book is going to be about. I also want to have an element of connection to the characters within it and I think it was missing here. It makes me upset that I didn't like it, because I really wanted to. But I know that this will be a buzzy book over the next few months.

Posted on onemoreword.uk - 26th April

I was delighted when I got approved for an eARC over on #NetGalley. I haven’t yet read Station Eleven but I’ve heard loads and loads of good reviews.

And The Glass Hotel cover is one of my favourite cover designs over the last year. Doesn’t it just grab your attention? It did mine.


I think this is an example of the book blurb not doing the novel justice. I think the blurb sounds a tad pedestrian. But I will put my hand up and say I probably couldn’t have done better if I was to try and outline the book, I would struggle to capture its magic as well.

The Glass Hotel is a book about the small details, and the writing – the beautiful, beautiful writing. It is s a meandering sort of story with some very memorable characters and beautiful settings. And lots of water imagery – some lovely and some eerie.

I thought The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel was a great read, and a book that I think is going to do well. Very. Well.

I wish I had taken the time to highlight some of the writing and my favourite passages but I simply read. I was absorbed in the world of The Glass Hotel and the Ponzi scheme. And the world the characters inhabited. In particular, I thought Vincent was a rather special character and her story line was probably my favourite.

I also learned something form The Glass Hotel – I learned what a Ponzi scheme was…

A Ponzi scheme (/ˈpɒnzi/, Italian: [ˈpontsi]; also a Ponzi game) is a form of fraud that lures investors and pays profits to earlier investors with funds from more recent investors. The scheme leads victims to believe that profits are coming from product sales or other means, and they remain unaware that other investors are the source of funds. A Ponzi scheme can maintain the illusion of a sustainable business as long as new investors contribute new funds, and as long as most of the investors do not demand full repayment and still believe in the non-existent assets they are purported to own.

WIKIPEDIA
I thought that The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel was utterly captivating, but of I was being super picky I did think it was maybe a tad confusing near the beginning. This a novel with a lot of characters and a lot of slightly disjointed threads that jump through different time periods and story arcs. Sounds confusing, right? But it isn’t it just takes a moment to all come together. It is a book that needs you to read it in larger chunks and dedicate a wee bit of time too.

I really enjoyed following the stories and lives of the individuals as it all unfolded.

The Glass Hotel was so good it gave me a massive book hangover. And it made me rush off to buy Station Eleven and add ALL of her other books to my wishlist.

The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel will be released on the 30th April – I highly recommend it. I received a copy for review from the publisher, via NetGalley – Thank you!

The Glass Hotel by Emily St John Mandel

Trying to make sense of what is going on in this story is challenging but it is well worth the effort! The book starts with Vincent, actually a woman, falling into the sea and then diverts to tell the story of Paul who turns out to be her brother.

Then, everything changes and we are at a hotel, the hotel Caiette, in the middle of nowhere and then it turns out that Vincent and Paul are working there and so there's some back story about that and a few other people turn up. Paul leaves after some innuendo that he has defaced a window with acid.

And, a bit later, Vincent who was working the bar turns up in a new section of the novel acting as the unmarried trophy wife of the hotel owner Jonathan Alkaitis and living a life of total affluence. There's a bit more back story to explain why, and Vincent takes up video filming in a small way. Some more characters emerge at this point mostly also filthy rich.

Jonathan works in investments helping rich people with large sums to invest get bigger returns than on the market. There is a bit of a diversion into another story which is about how Olivia, one of the investors, got drawn in.

Anyway, read on a bit further and Jonathan is now in prison. It was all a Ponzi scheme so that the payouts relied on new investors and the whole edifice was eventually bound to fall. There is a new theme emerging here with some back story about the company and the key employees. Also, we hear something about the 'counterlife' which is a kind of alternative reality into which Jonathan is sinking and people start seeing ghosts.

Somehow all these divergent stories begin to come together, Vincent gets a job as a cook on a merchant ship and if you remember the start of this review then that's where we are.

Confused? Of course you are but this is actually an excellent, complex and multilayered read so what is going on? You can read it in many ways but I think it is a kind of multi-verse. Vincent who is a kind of elusive person, almost transparent, is able to move between these different worlds: the world she's brought up in; the world of the rich: the world of the poor and the world of the sea. Otherwise, these worlds are exclusive. Rich people, for example, actually have no idea what's going on apart from the busy activity of being rich. Imagine a Venn diagram of overlapping circles where Vincent, and to some extent Paul, exist in the region where many circles overlap and you can start to get the picture. It does all hold together within the narrative and there are no loose ends, just many endings.

The other key theme of the book is the great financial crash and there's something in there about how the staff and the investors in Jonathan's company, his own glass hotel, are complicit in his downfall. They all knew what was going on but preferred not to know as long as the money keeps rolling in. When it all comes apart not only them but all the small people feel the shock waves. There aren't any winners in this book but it is still exquisitely written, an excellent read and highly recommended.