On her trip she looks at details around Cuba and they remind her of incidents which took place in the past. The narrator, Clare, is the observant type. In essence it is a disjointed narrative of a wife who decides to attend a film festival in Cuba that her newly deceased husband was going to attend as well. As hilarious a storyteller as she is heartbreakingly honest, Elvis is a truly original voice in this exploration of grief, family, and the endurance of humor after loss.The Third Hotel is a slim novel that packs in a lot of interesting ideas. Elvis investigates the strange circumstances of her mother’s death and finds comfort, if not answers, in the people (and animals) of Freedom, Alabama. But there are things Elvis doesn’t yet know―like how to keep her sister Lizzie from poisoning herself while sleep-eating or why her father has started wearing her mother’s silk bathrobe around the house.

She knows she should plan to grieve her mother, who has recently drowned while sleepwalking, for exactly eighteen months. To learn more about RABBIT CAKE by Annie Hartnett, read here:Įlvis Babbitt has a head for the facts: she knows science proves yellow is the happiest color, she knows a healthy male giraffe weighs about 3,000 pounds, and she knows that the naked mole rat is the longest living rodent. The Third Hotel is a propulsive, brilliantly shape-shifting novel from an inventive author at the height of her narrative powers. As the distinction between reality and fantasy blurs, Clare finds grounding in memories of her childhood in Florida and of her marriage to Richard, revealing her role in his death and reappearance along the way. Grief-stricken and baffled, Clare tails Richard, a horror film scholar, through the newly tourist-filled streets of Havana, clocking his every move. He’s wearing a white linen suit she’s never seen before, and he’s supposed to be dead. Shortly after Clare arrives in Havana, Cuba, to attend the annual Festival of New Latin American Cinema, she finds her husband, Richard, standing outside a museum.

In Havana, Cuba, a widow tries to come to terms with her husband’s death-and the truth about their marriage-in Laura van den Berg’s surreal, mystifying story of psychological reflection and metaphysical mystery. To learn more about the THE THIRD HOTEL by Laura van den Berg, read here: Come hear a brilliant voice in American fiction! FREE & OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. Laura van den Berg reads from her haunting new novel THE THIRD HOTEL, out from FSG! She’ll be in conversation with local author Annie Hartnett (RABBIT CAKE) after the reading, followed by a Q&A and book signing.

Laura van den berg the third hotel