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The Glass Hotel

Written by: Emily St. John Mandel
Narrated by: Dylan Moore
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Publisher's Summary

Shortlisted for The Scotiabank Giller Prize

A Time Magazine Must Read Book of 2020

A Globe and Mail Top 100 Book of the Year

Number One National Best Seller

New York Times Best Seller

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 the northernmost tip of Vancouver Island. New York financier Jonathan Alkaitis owns the hotel. When he passes Vincent his card with a tip, it’s the beginning of their life together. That same day, a hooded figure 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 remote British Columbia, painting a breathtaking picture of greed and guilt, fantasy and delusion, art and the ghosts of our pasts. 

©2020 Emily St. John Mandel (P)2020 HarperAudio

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What listeners say about The Glass Hotel

Average Customer Ratings
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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

narrator not the best

it was hard to keep the characters straight as the narrators voice was monotone most of the time.

6 people found this helpful

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    2 out of 5 stars
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it was fine

narrator's inability to pronounce simple French words, or change voice between dialogue and narrative made this difficult to listen to. I thought a character was Russian, they were French... perhaps with a different author this book would have been more enjoyable

1 person found this helpful

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not sure I felt anything throughout the book.

that's kind of it. just didn't love or hate any character. didn't feel much tension. didn't feel compelled to understand a mystery. well-written but not compelling.

1 person found this helpful

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Okay

I was a big fan of Station Eleven by this same author but this story is not nearly as engaging. Nonetheless, I did listen all the way through.
The performance/reading is good.

1 person found this helpful

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Distracting Accents

Couldn't get past the narrator's voices. Moore makes everyone sound like they're from L.A. not rural Canada.

1 person found this helpful

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least favorite ST John novel

sorry Emily, this is my least favorite of your books. I didnt care about the characters. the book was actually boring and had no direction. usually I'm fine with books that ramble in places but this was just not entertaining. the narrator sounded whiny.
2 thumbs down

1 person found this helpful

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Outstanding Narration and Beautiful Ending

Dylan Moore's narration made the listen at once compelling and relaxing. it was perfect for this story. Now that it has ended I still want her in my ears. The novel was intriguing, transported me effectively to many captivating settings and ends beautifully. Overall, this recording is a fine work of art.

1 person found this helpful

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Disjointed

Usually enjoy multiple story lines that weave a complex tapestry. However, in this book, many of those storylines are weaving a completely disjointed whole. The characters have ties but they are loose for the most part. What is the point of Paul? his appearances do nothing for the book other than waste pages. You feel that with him being given pages at the beginning that he would be much more prominent.

On the whole, the storyline and characters were dull for lack of a better word. The narration is not very believable or energetic. The subject matter did little to engage this reader. Had high hopes once we got to the Glass Hotel on the beautiful North Island, but it was short-lived.

Not my cup of tea.

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Like a poem

This was really an interesting read (listen). Adored the multiple character storylines and the ebb and flow between them all. The variety and description of settings was beautiful. It was “heavy” feeling at times. Sad. Mournful. The story was unique enough to keep me engaged, though. Recommended.

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multiple plot lines

always fun to have a book with multiple plot lines. very good, a bit mellow somehow even though there's a lot of things that happen

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    1 out of 5 stars
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  • heather
  • 2022-02-15

Nothing Happens

I stuck with this because it was recommended to me, but I have no idea what I just listened to. way too many different characters and too much jumping around in time, between different people and even someone's imagination. I have no idea what this book was supposed to be about. I couldn't even name more than 3 or 4 of the main characters. I want those hours of my life back.

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  • Virginia A Reimer
  • 2021-01-02

Probably a better read than audiobook

There are a lot of characters and it jumps around in time a lot. I prefer more sequentiality told stories and found this one hard to follow. The topic of ponzi schemes was hard to relate to. I think the author is trying to say a lot in this book. To much. It will only be memorable in that it was so difficult to stick with and so completely disappointing in its ending. Overall a pretty depressing story.

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  • Tom
  • 2020-11-14

Close to the perfect book....

I started listening to Emily St. John Mandel's novels because of Station 11. I'm now finished four of her novels; this one is close to perfect. She is the master of multiple timelines and character narratives. I'm so glad I came across her work...so, so good!

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  • Amazon Customer
  • 2020-09-11

Interesting story. Unfortunately, poor performance.

The accents were truly terrible. The French Canadian sounded Russian, etc. Still, a good book.