Floating Hotel, by Grace Curtis, was a happy find for me, given my fondness for books set in hotels and multi-layered narratives with lots of voices. The Grand Abeona Hotel is kind of a first for me, however, given that the hotel itself actually travels between planets like a very, very large cruise ship. Manager Carl is practiced at keeping customers and staff happy. The hotel is on autopilot. Things should be smooth sailing but there are signs that not all is well at the Grand Abeona.
Each chapter of Floating Hotel is narrated by a different member of the hotel’s staff or a guest. The characters are all vibrant and complicated, just beautifully written. Some of the staff are hiding out in the Grand Abeona to avoid past crimes. Some are homeless orphans with nowhere else to go. One of the guests is a less-than-ethical professor who is a linguistic genius. Another academic on board is a socially awkward but brilliant mathematician. Two of the guests quickly reveal themselves to be absolutely ruthless assassins. I was actually a little surprised it took so long for someone to wind up dead, given how many people are lying and/or concealing dangerous secrets.
In a sense, everyone in the Grand Abeona is the main character of their own story. At least, they think so. Each chapter lifts the curtain on a character and another piece of the larger story. It’s up to us readers to discern how the author weaves the various stories together to deliver an overall narrative. It took me a few chapters to figure out that something bigger than just the murder of a guest was happening at the Grand Abeona. Curtis throws in some fantastic twists at the end (that I don’t want to spoil) that made my jaw drop once I learned what was really going on.
I loved watching the plot coalesce around the characters’ stories. Curtis has a gift for getting us up to speed on the troubled (and troubling) empire without bogging down the pace or taking the focus off of the characters as they rush around the Grand Abeona executing their schemes, hiding evidence, cracking codes, or trying to track down a side of ox meat on a planet on strike, among other things. This book was a joy to read.