Welcome to the second day of our book club readalong for OwlCrate's April book, Hotel Magnifique!
Just a reminder that this will be a SPOILER discussion for Chapters 6-10 of Hotel Magnifique, so make sure you read are finished this section before continuing.
Discussion questions are listed below, and anyone who participates in the comments will be entered to win a free OwlCrate box! Don't forget, you can also post about the readalong on Instagram with the hashtag #OCHotelMagnifique for another chance to win!
The story continues...
Chapter 6:
In the Blue Room all the new staff have arrived for orientation. The maître, Alastair, appears in a large mirror. He tells them that everyone must be inside the hotel each day by midnight, as if they are left outside when the hotel moves they will completely disappear. He tells them that as long as they follow the rules, there will be no trouble. And the rules will be introduced to them by their supervisors in the coming days.
Béatrice tells the new maids their duties and says that every seven days there is a soiree for the guests to welcome midnight, and they must not get in the way. Tonight is one such night so they are to eat their dinner in their room. Soon the Madam des Rêves comes for Zosa, and Béatrice tells Jani that she will be assigned a room closer to the other performers. For the first time in her life Jani will have her own room. As Jani tries to navigate back to her room she comes across a weather closet, but when she opens it it only reveals mops and brooms. She is startled by Bel, who says he will show her how the closets work if she never enters one again. Jani agrees.
Chapter 7:
Inside the closet Jani opens her eyes to find them standing on a rock in the ocean, looking back at land where the hotel is squeezed between two houses. They aren’t actually outside, but the closet is enchanted to make it feel like they are. Bel leads Jani to a lift manned by Zelig, who used to be king, but traded all of his vast wealth to stay in the hotel for 12 years, which is why guests can now only stay for two weeks. The kingdom Zelig ruled was angry and banished the hotel from its land, angering Alastair.
Up on the sixth floor Bel takes her to a special window which shows guests their home - where they will be returning to once their stay is over. It is showing Jani Durc. Bel reveals that the windows only work for guests, and Jani can see it because in his hurry on the night she arrived Bel accidentally had her sign a guest contract, not a worker one. He warns her not to tell anyone that she signed the incorrect contract, and should she have any questions, to only speak with him.
Chapter 8:
Taking the stairs Bel directed her down to her room, Jani unexpectedly ends up directly in the soiree, with the stairwell to her room on the other side. She tries to sneak through the soiree, and while doing so witnesses suminaires performing incredible magical acts for the guests. She just about to the stairwell when a server tells her that the two people guarding the doorway out are Sido and Sazerat, suminaires who report to Alastair. Cursing, Jani hides until it is nearly midnight when Alastair and Madam des Réves come on stage. They introduce the Magnifique, who is the suminaire that each night moves the hotel to Elsewhere. The Magnifique one of the most powerful suminaires there are, and he is also Bel.
Chapter 9:
In the morning Jani reports for work and is shown with the other new maids through the guest rooms where each room is unique and enchanted by the maître. When Jani introduces herself to one of the other maids, Sophie, she at first doesn’t respond, and is then met with some hostility and she finds throughout the day that most maids react in a similar way when she tries to speak with them, often stopping mid sentence to start cleaning again, as if following the rules was life or death.
The next day Jani has a growing sense of unease. There seems to be something just a little off about the hotel. Joining her fellow maids again Béatrice leads them to the Salon de Beaute which Madam des Rêves created as a model of a famous dressing rooms in Champilliers. Béatrice has never been to the real rooms outside of the hotel, because despite Champilliers being one the biggest cities, and hotel does not travel there on Alastair’s orders. Dismissing the rest of the maids to the laundry room, Jani finds Sophie in the hallway clutching her head, claiming she has a headache, but also that she can’t remember if she has had them before. The guest tells Jani that Sophie said she doesn’t like to go outside.
Deciding to find Bel and ask more questions, Jani ends up in a room with the walls lined with intaglios of the same women’s profile depicting different emotions. She notices one with the woman holding a finger to her lips, and when Jani leans close she hears someone whisper “be careful who you trust.” Just then Alastair appears and tells her to leave. Sophie runs.
Chapter 10:
Finding her group of maids again they head to the games room, where because of inclement weather the guests are treated to a sort of escape room type puzzle game, but once you’re inside, there is no getting out until the exit is discovered. The guests inside the game cannot see outside the confines of the game and seem to be in a glass room, but when Jani stumbles and tries to brace herself on the glass she falls straight through and into a game. A suminaire, Red, is using her artéfact (a word she said she shouldn’t have revealed) to slowly fill up the teapot shaped room with tea. Jani notices a tattoo on Red’s forehead that reminds her of people from another land, but when she asks Red where she’s from Red can’t remember.
Questions:
- Why do you think that staff seem to be forgetting about their lives?
- Who do you think the woman in the intaglios is?
- Why do you think Bel didn’t reveal to Jani he was the Magnifique?
- If Bel is so important, why do you think it was he who came to get Zosa?
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