The Paragon Hotel

The Paragon Hotel by Lyndsay Faye   432 pages

In this beautifully written novel, the Paragon Hotel is based on Portland, Oregon’s, Golden West Hotel, which was a haven for people of color, mainly African Americans, from 1906 to 1931. Author Faye says in the Historical Note that the descriptions she uses of the hotel is as accurate as she can make them. She did a great job, as I felt I knew the place inside out.

At the core of this novel is racism. I found is horrifying to learn that in the 1844, prior to statehood, Oregon’s Legislative Committee did its best to make the territory exclusively white. History shouldn’t surprise me, but it does. Oregon was “the only state of among the fifty ever to explicitly deny blacks the right and live and work there.” Since the NOW sections of the novel take place in 1921, this denial is most apparent. The THEN sections of the story provide the backstory that helps the reader understand the blacks’ plight.

Alice “Nobody” James is on the run from the New York Mafia with a bullet wound in her side. She boards a train bound westfor Portland. She is very sick by the time she arrives. She befriends Max, the black porter who takes pity on her, and takes her to the Paragon, a haven for “small and increasingly besieged black population.” The fact that Nobody is white makes them uneasy. Most of the residents like, or at least interested in Nobody, but not everyone.

 

Still, Nobody fits right in. That’s her super power, to be able to remain totally forgettable no matter what situation she finds herself in. She makes friends with most of the residence, especially cabaret singer Blossom Fontaine, who reminded me a lot of The Lady Chablis from “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.”

As Nobody heals, a young boy goes missing. As the search progresses more and more dirty little secrets come to life.

This book is complex with its dualing timelines and threads of  mental illness, the Mob, racism, love, friendship, secrets, romance---all set against the backdrop of a hotel exclusively for people pf color. Faye has a wonderful writing style. Nobody’s language is dead-on for a gun moll. It isn’t forced whatsoever. Faye has the ability to take tired old clichés and similes and make them new and bright. I wish I had marked some of them.

 “The Paragon Hotel” receives 5 out of 5 stars in Julie’s world.

Together at the Table: A Novel of Lost Love and Second Helpings

Together at the Table: A Novel of Lost Love and Second Helpings; Book 3 in the Two Blue Doors Series by Hillary Manton Lodge    320 pages

When I saw that this third book in Hillary Manton Lodge’s Two Blue Door Series was available for review from Blogging for Books, I jumped at the opportunity to review it (and it didn’t hurt that I got it for FREE!).

I was highly irritated at the end of Book Two. The story just stopped; literally it just stopped. It was a wonderful read until that point. I was eager to know what happened between Juliette and Neil. And would she learn the truth about the man she thought was her grandfather and the man who may have been? Book Three does not disappoint.

When we last saw Juliette, her mother had been diagnosed with cancer; the restaurant she opened with her brother, Nico, was off to a good start; she had traveled to Italy to meet both her paternal and maternal relative and try to solve the mystery of who was her grandfather; but her long-distance romance with Memphis-based immunologist Neil McLaren had ended.

Since then, her mother has died, leaving a gaping hole in the family. No one is quite over the shock. The restaurant is a success. She is dating the sous-chef Adrian. She has read the letters she discovered by her grandmother, but hasn’t had the time to follow up, and she is not over Neil McLaren, no matter what comes out of her mouth.

Taking a break from her hectic schedule, she takes a walk on Portland’s riverfront with Adrian. There in the distance is a familiar figure. Could it be Neil?  Her heart tells her it is.

In a delightful novel, Manon Lodge ties up all the loose ends and give readers a satisfying conclusion. I’ll miss these characters and hope that she reconsiders and gives us a fourth Two Blue Doors. I think it’s doable.