A GENTLEMAN IN MOSCOW by Amor Towles ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

(Original review written December 16, 2020)

It’s been a weird year, and a tough year. If I could pick one book for the quality and the coziness to get through whatever this or any other year throws at us, it would be this one.

Sooo cozy, and entrancing. Almost like a salve to soothe your mental health and whisk you away to a different time and place, though while an equally confusing and questionable period in its own way, living it vicariously through the Count and the Metropol is somehow comforting. A refined, yet approachable duo to escape with.

The author entirely succeeds in making this fantasy-of-a-residence seem extra romantic, which any other year (not to discount its greatness) might feel like a bigger feat. Stuck in one place for an unnatural, unending period of time — yep, this couldn’t have been a more appropriately timed book. I’ve noted and reviewed how certain books appear to find me at coincidental times. This will inevitably be a phenomenon I expect to recur many times in life. But this one came almost like a prescription. And to arrive right at the end of such a tumultuous year is even more nurturing, and hopeful.

I imagine all of us could write a novel about the endearing aspects of our quarantine/exile surroundings this year (the tree branch laying against the window, the dog’s blanket-hoarding spot, a questionably designed kitchen), as well as the little antagonists we’ve encountered (off-putting apartment gym occupants, dated furniture arrangements, a new depth of boredom). That appreciation of the details extends to the Count’s world, and I fell in love with the language used to make them come to life.

I already want to return to the feeling of reading this for the first time, and to connecting to something so personally this year. I doubt I’ll make it long before I have to try.