A gentleman in Moscow / Amor
Towles.

I heard about this novel from someone here on KT and although
I don’t remember who that was, many thanks to them for introducing me to this charming
book. In 1922, Count Alexander Ilyich
Rostov has been deemed an unrepentant aristocrat, a Former Person, by a
Bolshevik tribunal and he is spared from being shot only because of a few
friends he has in the party. He is
sentenced to house arrest in the Metropol, a grand hotel across the street from
the Kremlin and if he sets foot outside the hotel, he will be executed. The grand and spacious suite that he occupied in
the hotel is taken over by government officials and he must move to a tiny room
in the attic.

Despite being confined to the hotel for many years, Rostov’s
life is eventful. He develops relationships with other hotel residents including
a willful actress, a shrewd Kremlinite, a gregarious American and a
temperamental chef, and keeps abreast of the tumultuous politics of the country. He becomes a “father” to two young girls and
when fate suddenly puts the life of a young girl in his hands, he must draw on
all his ingenuity to protect the future she so deserves. The book has a very satisfying ending.

Library Journal review: Having chronicled upper-crust 1938 New York in
his elegant debut, Rules of Civility, Towles grandly unfolds the life of Count
Alexander Ilyich Rostov in Soviet-era Moscow. The count is condemned by his
past to permanent house arrest at the sumptuous Metropole Hotel, where he
inhabits a tiny attic he's turned into a reflection of his rich interior life.
Having expected to idle away his hours at his country estate, the count is
initially at loose ends, his very values challenged. But he befriends little
Nina, who teaches him the secrets of the Metropole and leaves him with a
wonderful gift, and after a moment of despair launches on a whole new course.
The count becomes head waiter at the Boyarsky, the hotel's fabled restaurant,
forming a Triumvirate with chef Emile and maître d' Andrey as he purveys taste,
discretion, and culture in a bloodily upturned world. Meanwhile, the Soviet
Union's many tragedies touch him (and readers) at a distance, communicating a
sense of life ever haunted and ever resilient. VERDICT As urbane, cultured, and
honey-smooth as the count himself, even as his situation inevitably creates
suspense, this enthralling work is highly recommended even for those unfamiliar
with Soviet history.