Book Review: Hotel Noir by Casper Silk

Synopsis:
Welcome to the Hotel Noir, peerless gem of hospitality and sole holder of a Michelin star on the island of St. Germaine.

When the controversial American author Francis Stein is stabbed to death in the hotel’s environs, the search for his murderer takes islander Bat Manley north to the other half of Stein’s double life, south to St. Germaine’s vice-ridden slums, and finally into the realm of the psyche, where the blind see and the dead speak.

A kaleidoscopic striptease of the human soul, Hotel Noir will make you sweat.
What the Author Says About the Book:
"Hotel Noir is not your typical whodunit and yet this is a murder mystery--or is it?
 
I prefer to think of it as a whydunit.  Hotel Noir is many things: a portrait of an island in flux, an intergenerational love story, a dress rehearsal for the apocalypse... 
 
You set the story on the island of St. Germaine. I've searched an atlas and can't find this island anywhere.
 
St. Germaine exists in the realm of the imagination where heaven and hell converge and the bartender never forgets to add that second olive to your martini. 
 
Hotel Noir brings together a bizarre cast of characters--a failed politician, an Oxford anthropologist, a blind soothsayer, a pimp...
 
A renegade saint, a drug-dealing ex-convict... 
 
And yet the story has an almost lofty tone. 
 
I still believe in the moral compass. My protagonists may wrestle with doubt and temptation, they may be weak and flawed, but ultimately someone in the story will rise above the pack and do something inspired, heroic. Those moments of illumination and grace are, for me, the mark of great fiction.
 
Your other books, written under your own name, have been well reviewed and even won awards. Why adopt a pseudonym for Hotel Noir? 
 
Hotel Noir is fundamentally different--in tone, genre and perspective--from my other books. Readers and critics have come to expect certain qualities from my directly authored works. By adopting a literary alter ego, I free myself to experiment, to take my own dares, in the hope of creating something without precedent."


Review: This is another of those books that you start reading and aren't sure if you will keep reading it, but it just drags you in, toe hold by toe hold, til you are so immersed in it, you are surprised to realize you have suddenly read half of the book! Each chapter brings more life to the island, echoes the instability of Francis' ability to save one of the islanders from herself, and how the religious and historical culture of the island, is not only changing it, but eroding it from the inside out. Will the puzzle be solved? This is one you need to read to discover that answer! In many ways the book reminded me of Thomas Wolfe's You Can't Go Home Again- there are so many layers, that you have to go slow and read between the lines at times, to see the story that is there and waiting for the reader. This one may take some time to get through, but it is an interesting read!

About the Author: Casper Silk is the pseudonym of an award-winning author whose works defy easy categorization, combining elements of literary and genre fiction, and straying from the straight-and-narrow of chronology into a kaleidoscopic striptease of the human soul. 

Readers throughout the ages have made a sport of unmasking pseudonymous authors, and the rumor mill is already churning out identities for the enigmatic Silk. 

So, who is Casper Silk? We’re not at liberty to say—yet. But here’s a hint: there is a long tradition of female authors adopting male pen names. And another: the author in question has a body of work critics have variously called “lyrical,” “heart-wrenching,” and “heroic.” 

Disclosure / Disclaimer: I received this ebook, free of charge, from Pale Fire Press, for review purposes on this blog. No other compensation, monetary or in kind, has been received or implied for this post. Nor was I told how to post about it