Jane Rogoyska’s Hotel Exile connects the Lutetia’s émigrés, wartime occupiers and returning deportees. The US edition appeared July 7; Jethro K. Lieberman’s October 15 review supplies the new discovery.
His account of an Abwehr diner’s artichoke mishap exposes the danger underneath the absurdity. Kirkus recounts three Buchenwald survivors unable to settle in the hotel beds, sleeping on the floor instead. These small scenes give the history its human scale. Lieberman praises the episodic writing while noting its loose connections.