Gentleman in Moscow (Towles) - Book Reviews

Book Reviews
In Amor Towles’ sparkling new novel, the dreary landscape of the former Soviet Union is transformed into a fairy tale land of candlelit dinners, hidden treasures, love struck movie stars, and precocious little girls. It all takes place within the walls of Moscow’s famed Metropol, one of the world’s grand luxury hotels. There, in 1922, Count Alexander Rostov is placed under house arrest for the remainder of his life. And what a life it turns out to be!  READ MORE.
Molly Lundquist - LitLovers


The novel buzzes with the energy of numerous adventures, love affairs, twists of fate and silly antics.... And there is some beautiful writing.... [But while] the author’s light, waggish style suited the cafe society of Rules of Civility,... Stalin’s Soviet Union is another matter, and this is where his novel fails. "Let us concede," he remarks, "that the early thirties in Russia were unkind." Over four million people perished from famine in the U.S.S.R. in the early 1930s.... To flippantly refer to this moment as "unkind"...speaks to a disturbing lack of empathy and even moral imagination.
Douglas Smith - Wall Street Journal


Count Rostov is a memorable character you come to care about and root for.... Towles introduces his character slowly, offering glimpses of the man and his past as the story proceeds. But from the start, Rostov is quite the Renaissance man. He can taste the nettles tucked under the Ukrainian ham of a saltimbocca "fashioned from necessity"; seat a banquet's worth of Soviet bigwigs with a diplomat's dexterity; memorably bed an actress; befriend practically everyone; and quietly outwit dogmatic apparatchiks.... "Marvelous" is a word I'd use for this book..., [which] left me with conflicting emotions. I was happy for a good, engaging read. And I was sad that it was over and I had to bid Count Rostov adieu.
Bill Daley - Chicago Tribune
 
 
Rostov passes the decades making a whole world out of a hotel and the people in it....[living] a full and rich life according to the principle that, "If one did not master one's circumstances, one was bound to be mastered by them." A Gentleman in Moscow is a novel that aims to charm, not be the axe for the frozen sea within us. And the result is a winning, stylish novel that keeps things easy. Flair is always the goal Towles never lets anyone merely say goodbye when they could bid adieu, never puts a period where an exclamation point or dramatic ellipsis could stand.  winning, stylish novel.
NPR.org

Enjoyable, elegant.... As years pass, Rostov finds that his confinement has conversely broadened his personal horizons.... There are two surprises at the end of the novel; you’ll nod at one, and raise your eyebrows at the other. Even greater delights, though, are found in Towles’ glorious turns of phrase.
Melissa Davis - Seattle Times
 

Irresistible.... In his second elegant period piece investment banker turned novelist Amor Towles continues to explore the question of how a person can lead an authentic life in a time when mere survival is a feat in itself.... Towles’s tale, as lavishly filigreed as a Faberge egg, gleams with nostalgia for the golden age of Tolstoy and Turgenev...reminding the reader that though Putin may be having a moment, it’s Pushkin who’s eternal.
Oprah Magazine
 

The book moves briskly from one crisp scene to the next, and ultimately casts a spell as encompassing as Rules of Civility, a book that inhales you into its seductively Gatsby-esque universe.
Town & Country


[A]n engaging 30-year saga set almost entirely inside the Metropol, Moscow’s most luxurious hotel.... Episodic, empathetic, and entertaining, Count Rostov’s long transformation occurs against a lightly sketched background of upheaval, repression, and war. Gently but dauntlessly, like his protagonist, Towles is determined to chart the course of the individual.
Publishers Weekly


(Starred review.) Towles grandly unfolds the life of Count Alexander Ilyich Rostov in Soviet-era Moscow.... As urbane, cultured, and honey-smooth as the count himself, even as his situation inevitably creates suspense, this enthralling work is highly recommended.  —Barbara Hoffert
Library Journal


In his remarkable first novel, the bestselling Rules of Civility, Towles etched 1930s New York in crystalline relief.... His latest polished literary foray into a bygone era is just as impressive...an imaginative and unforgettable historical portrait.
Booklist


(Starred review.) Count Alexander Rostov...lives the fullest of lives, discovering the depths of his humanity..... A masterly encapsulation of modern Russian history, this book more than fulfills the promise of Towles' stylish debut, Rules of Civility (2011).
Kirkus Reviews