Book Review: The Hotel Guest

The Hotel Guest by Rosemary Henningan is a destination thriller set in a remote hotel beside a lake in the French Alps.

In the past, Kit Costigan is desperate for a fresh start and to get away from her family and ex-boyfriend in Ireland, so when she finds a job as a waitress at a remote, mysterious abbey-turned-turned hotel, she thinks this will be the perfect summer escape. During the present day, readers also find out that Kit has been lying low, living anonymously in London, when she receives a mysterious invitation to return to the Abbaye. I felt Kit was well-developed as a character; I understood her motivations and the dual-timeline fully developed her character, while leaving room for suspense as well.

The Past

When Kit first arrived in France, she was drawn into the inner circle of the hotel owner’s son, Louis, and his reclusive, intellectual group of friends, a group of philosophers called the Olympians (charming JP, fragile Gaia, and ambitious Iris). While she is a waitress and they are upper-class post-doc scholars, they still become friends. The Olympians are all about free will and trying to live out their unique moral codes, while also arguing all of the time. To Kit, they seem a bit strange, ambitious, and weirdly entangled, with dramatic relationships, but overall, intriguing and irresistible.

At times, this group was giving Secret History vibes. Kit had vowed to steer clear of relationships, based on her past trauma and secrets, but she was lonely and desperate for friendship, so the obsessive group of friends drew her in.  

The Present

The suspense is heightened as the novel moves through a dual-timeline narrative. Readers understand that one of the groups’ members went missing all those summers ago, and someone else has called them all together for a reunion during a prestigious Philosophy Conference at the Abbaye. When their secret is threatened to be revealed by one of the group, Kit has to decide what to do next.

Love Triangle…or Square?

The book flashes back to Kit falling in love with JP, who was in a love triangle with Iris and previously… yet one of the women is not ready to forgive and forget. As Gaia starts to act more erratic, the friends worry about what will happen to her, and JP and Kit are forced to hide their relationship. When they meet up again years later, no one can ignore their shared history.

 Who has changed the most? Who would risk it all for their ambition? And who is threatening to tell their long-lost secrets?

The Setting

If you know me, you know I LOVE a destination thriller. The novel’s setting is Abbaye de Saint Maurice, a lakeside luxury hotel in the French Alps, near the Swiss border.

In The Hotel Guest, I loved the atmospheric setting. I could picture every detail, from the views of lake to the arduous nearby hiking trails! The isolation of everyone living by the lake, at the hotel and nearby mansion, added a layer of claustrophobia and surreality to the decisions that characters made.

Destination thriller fans who enjoy books by Andrea Bartz, Lucy Clarke, and Helen Cooper will love The Hotel Guest.

Thank you to Harlequin Trade Publishing, Park Row, and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.