Joined in 2023 
82 
63 About this deal
Unfortunately, it was Lev that caught Anastasia's eye -- a lowly hotel employee at the time, rather than a wealthy banker. Scarletta Leonas, another guest at the hotel, discovers that the reason there’s no Room 622 is that an unsolved murder has occurred. She begins working with Joël as a sort of assistant and the two amateur sleuths attempt to establish the sequence of the events leading up to the weekend of the murder. I’ve just been on the choo-choo train to the land of disappointment especially as I really really enjoyed The Truth about the Harry Quebert Affair, The Baltimore Boys though it has to be said less so The Disappearance of Stephanie Mailer. With this being said, I do see how some people might think the book to be a little too long for its own good. If you’re the kind of person who just wants to see the resolution dropped into their lap as fast as possible, then you’re probably going to struggle with certain segments which only feel like they raise more questions rather than provide solutions. I personally love this approach, but to each their own. Many of the characters bite their tongue when they really should be more open -- most notably Anastasia -- and of course Macaire sits on that big secret of working so long as a secret agent.
The Enigma of Room 622 by Jo l Dicker - Publishers Weekly The Enigma of Room 622 by Jo l Dicker - Publishers Weekly
Adding to the mystery of the story, there was sort of a “book within a book” element. This was a bit confusing to me at first. But it worked well as part of the story. Como es habitual en sus libros hay muchos personajes principales en la historia, en esta en concreto hasta él mismo forma parte del elenco, el Escritor, con mayúsculas, algo que supongo que parte de la crítica y muchos lectores no le perdonaran porque puede dar la impresión de que el ego del autor bordea o supera todo lo admisible, a mí no deja de parecerme un juego en el que el autor nos invita a participar, un metalibro o un experimento de metaliteratura. A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.He bluffed that he was a Romanov, which kept Anastasia's mother happy for a time, but of course his actual identity was eventually exposed -- and readers know that she wound up with Macaire. Macaire's father was impressed by Lev and offered him a position at the bank -- despite Lev having no professional training or higher education. Quizá con 200 páginas menos hubiese mejorado, porque la historia (aunque enrevesada) resulta interesante. Meanwhile, Anastasia has been having an affair with Lev -- apparently the love of her life, but someone she is preparing to leave as her husband is named president. Por momentos se me hacía aburrido, mucha información sin llegar a ningún lado (o avanzando pero muy lentamente).
The Enigma of Room 622 by Joël Dicker, Robert Bononno
El enigma de la habitación 622 es un thriller retorcido en el que nada es lo que parece. Encontraremos juegos de poder, envidias, triángulos amorosos, traiciones, celos.. He writes that when, after two months, the affair came to an abrupt end he decided he needed a break he headed off to Verbier -- a place Bernard was also fond of.Sí, ya me he dado cuenta que no ha querido escribir una novela negra, sino más bien una novela de suspense inglés, más ligera, pero no hacía falta hacerlo de un modo tan chabacano, con ese tono como de novelita barata donde todo vale. More time is dedicated to the murder in the past, which was a bit of a disappointment since the ‘today’ story is more interesting than the murder in the past. The wealthy private bank family machinations of the earlier murder seem unrealistic, bland and contrived, like having a complex plot explained to you after a movie leaves you totally befuddled. As to the murderer, that identity too remains unknown -- but at least there is a reasonable explanation for that: "the crime had never been resolved" and: "The murderer was never revealed".
The Enigma of Room 622 - Joël Dicker - Complete Review The Enigma of Room 622 - Joël Dicker - Complete Review
The small board of the bank was to decide on who would succeed Abel -- whereby the board members themselves were ineligible. The frustrations over the constantly withheld information -- especially since it is done so blatantly -- don't help either. A few days prior to the murder Macaire Ebezner is in Madrid and anxious to get home to Geneva where the expectation is that he will be named president of Ebezner bank except he isn’t, as Lev Levovitch is, who is having an affair with Macaire’s Anastasia.
I’ll admit it also helps that I found the premise itself to be quite clever and conducive to a long and winding murder mystery, one which in and of itself feels like a prolonged vacation, at least from my reader’s perspective. The events surrounding the room’s history are genuinely interesting and I found myself tightly hooked whenever Joel and Scarlett were uncovering some juicy new pieces of information, regardless of whether it brought me closer to the ultimate revelations. The Outlandish Hotel The first would be the setting. The setting of the book is mostly Geneva and Verbier, Switzerland. I have been to Switzerland more than once, so I’m somewhat familiar with the vibe there already. But this book made me really imagine walking the streets of Geneva and wondering about all those secret international banking laws – something I’ve always been fascinated by. And the Verbier setting made me imagine myself skiing in the Alps and enjoying a wonderful apres-ski. Lev es el hombre al que todo se le da bien y que consigue ganarse rápidamente el aprecio de cualquiera. It all starts with an innocuous curiosity: at the Hotel de Verbier, a luxury hotel in the Swiss Alps, there is no Room 622. The characters are interesting, likable, and a bit mysterious. But, why not? It’s a mystery, right?
The Enigma of Room 622” by Joel Dicker - Bookwormex “The Enigma of Room 622” by Joel Dicker - Bookwormex
The presidency has always been handed down in the family, and Macaire expects to be named president -- but in those days leading up to the announcement he learns that some people seem to have other plans. He chooses the Hotel de Verbier in the Swiss Alps as his sanctuary, a fancy luxury resort where hospitality comes above everything else. Needless to say, what promises to be an idyllic vacation leading to recovery becomes anything but that, and it all starts with a rather peculiar detail: there is no room 622 at the hotel. He has an excuse -- but not one he can reveal: for twelve years he's been living a double-life, working as a secret agent for: "P-30, a section within the Department of Defence financed by a secret account, which was virtually unknown -- including to the powerful parliamentary intelligence committee -- and which reported directly to the Federal Council". It does have its charms, once you get what it's going for it can be a very nice, breezy change of pace from the dreary bleakness in so much crime fiction.I don’t know if it’s meant to be a take on a French farce but that’s what it feels like with similar (not) humour. Not that real Dan Brown is a paragon of female liberation. But this book is fundamentally uninterested in women except as they are prizes for men to win, or providing sex or withholding sex from the author insert character. Come on--did no woman read this book and point this out?!!? (Don’t answer that question, it will probably just depress me). The most prominent female character who doesn’t sleep with or pine after the author insert character is fought over and manipulated by the men in this book in a way that indicates the author fundamentally does not believe women have any agency or free will at all. Ew.
Great Deal 
New Comment