The Hotel

Contributors

By Elizabeth Bowen

Introduction by Yiyun Li

Formats and Prices

On Sale
Mar 3, 2026
Page Count
248 pages
Publisher
Union Square & Co.
ISBN-13
9781454962410

Price

$17.99

Format

Trade Paperback

Format:

Trade Paperback $17.99

An awkward young woman develops an “unsuitable attachment” to a beautiful, worldly widow in a queer-coded novel set in a luxurious hotel on the Italian Riviera.

Sydney Warren is a young, rebellious women in her twenties, uninterested in marriage and a puzzle to her friends and family. While staying at a luxurious hotel on the Italian Riviera, she becomes infatuated with Mrs. Kerr, an older and very beautiful widow—and the two women’s close friendship swiftly becomes the subject of gossip at the hotel. But when Mrs. Kerr’s young son arrives to visit his mother, the balance of Sydney and Mrs. Kerr’s relationship is upset: a drama that plays out in front of an array of delightful, fascinating minor characters.

Originally published in 1927, Elizabeth Bowen’s first novel follows a group of British tourists vacationing on the Italian Riviera. The Hotel is a debut novel that explores social and emotional relationships and one young woman’s coming-of-age.

Series:


Elizabeth Bowen

About the Author

Elizabeth Bowen (1899–1973) was an Irish-British novelist and short-story writer who often wrote about fraught and unfulfilling relationships among the upper-middle class. Her most well-known novels include The Hotel (1927), The Death of the Heart (1938), and The Heat of the Day (1948). 

Learn more about this author