I am so happy to report that this novel was truly a great read, sure to be on my favorites list at the end of the year. I was a little thrown by not loving my last Lyndsay Faye book, but faintingviolet rightly pointed out that it was her first published book, so it’s natural for it to not be as good. It does appear that Faye is only getting better and better. I loved Jane Steele and I LOVED The Paragon Hotel.
The story centers on Alice James, fleeing for her life via cross-country train going from mafioso Little Italy to white nationalist Oregon. She’s just trying to survive without people back home knowing she’s still alive. The narrative jumps back and forth from her life in New York as witness and party to the mafia power plays, to her new life in Oregon, staying at the titular Paragon Hotel. It’s a hotel catering to non-white, mostly black travelers and stragglers. It was basically illegal to be black in Oregon in 1921 and the Klan is growing in numbers there, so tensions are rising fast and having a white woman staying at the hotel isn’t helping matters. When a little black boy goes missing and search parties of black people start going out every day and night, things really reach a boiling point.
The story is about found family with a little bit of a mystery element. The publisher seems to be touting this as a historical thriller and um, no. It’s historical fiction with a light mystery element. Full stop. Faye is at her best here, juggling story lines and many characters with aplomb. This is a wonderfully complex story that doesn’t feel complex while reading it because Faye is so good at writing propelling plots. She’s examining a lot of layers of intersectionality in a way that feels natural and unforced. There are memorable characters on every page that feel real and barely contained by the book.