Book of the day: The Listeners by Maggie Stiefvater

American writer Maggie Stiefvater’s first novel for adults is a hugely satisfying read that shuts out the rest of the world. Photos / Supplied

Maggie Stiefvater’s latest novel has a deliciously intriguing premise: in 1942, June Hudson, the general manager of a very upmarket hotel in West Virginia, is told in no uncertain terms by US authorities that she is to accommodate a group of enemy diplomats after the US joins the allies in
World War II.

The group of 300 Japanese, Germans, Italian and Hungarians arrive at the exquisitely run Avallon Hotel in the Appalachian mountains, owned by the wealthy Gilfoyle family. June’s instructions are to treat them well, in the hope that US diplomats in European and Asian enemy territories will be treated in a similar fashion. If anything happens to the diplomats, there will be an international incident.

June is an attractive woman in her 30s, with an air of authority, who is well respected by her large staff and the local residents. Despite her air of calm, she has a lot on her mind – she was the protégé of the hotel’s recently deceased founder, Francis Gilfoyle, and enamoured with his eldest son, Edgar. She is also worried about some of her best employees going off to war.

June is given a set of new rules by the State Department and the FBI, which have also taken up residence at the Avallon. She comes up against the intriguing Agent Tucker Minnick. He has a coal miner’s tattoo on his neck, suggesting he has his own West Virginian story to tell.

The novel incorporates elements of magical realism. The reason June was chosen to be GM was because she, like Francis Gilfoyle, had the knack of settling the mysterious sweetwater, or mineral springs, running below the hotel buildings, which tend to get riled up when guests’ emotions are running high.

And one German family that is a guest of the US government is in a state of high tension. Hannelore Wolfe, the young child of cultural attaché Friedrich and his wife Sabine, is a bit different – she doesn’t talk but is highly intelligent. A child like her will have an unpleasant fate in Nazi Germany if and when the family returns.

June, who was not unlike Hannelore as a child, can’t help but feel a connection. At the Avallon the real power comes to those who watch and listen, and both she and Hannelore excel at this.

Stiefvater is a bestselling author of YA fiction, and her first novel for adults is based on fact – top hotels really did take in enemy diplomats after the attack on Pearl Harbor. She fills the book with a rich cast of fictional characters, from the charismatic German pilot Erich von Limburg-Stirum and the chilling SS officer Lothar Liebe to the no-nonsense head of housekeeping, Toad Blankenship, who firmly controls her fiefdom within the hotel.

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As the time approaches for the unwelcome guests to leave, the sweetwater becomes more toxic and clamours for release, and the story comes to a grand crescendo. Stiefvater expertly keeps the reader guessing. Romance, political espionage, humour, it’s got it all. A hugely satisfying read that shuts out the rest of the world.

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