If I had to spend my life in confinement, I would choose to spend it with Count Alexander Rostov, the protagonist of Amor Towles amazing novel, A Gentleman in Moscow, and one of my favorite literary characters of all time.
Rostov is a Russian aristocrat, arrested during the revolution and spared death but sentenced to a life in the Hotel Metropol Moscow. It’s no ordinary hotel, however, but a luxury city all its own. The indefatigable and erudite Rostov relies on his good nature and good will to forge a life of friendship, romance and adventure within the hotel’s walls. He befriends the doorman, chef, seamstress, and nearly everyone who enters the hotel, most of all young Sofia, who after being abandoned by her mother, becomes Rostov’s adopted daughter.
Despite the limited scope of its geography, the book takes readers through decades of history, literature, revolutionary forces, and eventually to a most satisfying ending. It’s a warm-hearted, funny, good-natured book lying on top of fascinating historical details of the early 20th century. It left me smiling every time I put it down.
A Gentleman in Moscow has been added to my Top 10 favorite books of all time.