Claude Ballard was once a French pioneer when it comes to silent films. He started off working for the Lumiere brothers before he moved on to make his own short movies but his last movie The Electric Hotel bankrupted and ended his career. Now he's living at the Hollywood Knickerbocker Hotel foraging mushrooms in the hills of Los Angels. And that's where a history major student comes to find and interview him. To talk about his career and this brings back memories. Claude starts to remember his past, the making of the films and most of all Sabine Montrose, his muse.
I had a period when I watched a lot of silent movies and among those I watched was the really old, short ones, like Lumiere and Edison's, etc. It's such an interesting time in history. And, who doesn't love a story about a muse, a lost movie, and a tragic love story? Sadly, this book didn't rock my boat. I found the pacing slow and the story was a bit tedious and I just couldn't connect with the characters. What made this book at least a bit interesting is the history of silent movies, the making of them and especially the making of The Electric Hotel and all the problems with it. Also, Sabine Montrose, she was the star of this book, the glue that made the book story bearable. So, when she was not in the focus when the book shifted the POV to someone else, well I just felt that my interested slowly decreased.
THE ELECTRIC HOTEL is a so-so book, there are some interesting bits and I did find the ending sweet. However, overall the story couldn't keep my interest all through. Still, if you are interested in silent movies is this book worth reading just for the small tidbits about the Lumiere brothers and Thomas Edison.
A sweeping work of historical fiction from the New York Times–bestselling author Dominic Smith, The Electric Hotel is a spellbinding story of art and love.
For more than thirty years, Claude Ballard has been living at the Hollywood Knickerbocker Hotel. A French pioneer of silent films who started out as a concession agent for the Lumière brothers, the inventors of cinema, Claude now spends his days foraging for mushrooms in the hills of Los Angeles and taking photographs of runaways and the striplings along Sunset Boulevard. But when a film history student comes to interview Claude about The Electric Hotel—the lost masterpiece that bankrupted him and ended the career of his muse, Sabine Montrose—the past comes surging back. In his run-down hotel suite, the ravages of the past are waiting to be excavated: celluloid fragments in desperate need of restoration, as well as Claude’s memories of the woman who inspired and beguiled him.
The Electric Hotel is a portrait of a man entranced by the magic of moviemaking, a luminous romance, and a whirlwind trip through early cinema. Sit back, relax, and enjoy the show.
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