Published By: Baskerville
Pages: 320
Released On: 30/04/2026
Welcome to the Hotel Orient Vienna’s most infamous love hotel, where cameras are banned, aliases are required and every anonymous guest has something to hide.
But a night in heaven is about to come at a deadly price, and it’s up to the hotel’s charming and quick-witted concierge, Sterling Lockwood, to discover the killer hiding amongst the sinners.
Check into the Hotel Orient and prepare for a thrilling case that will leave your heart pounding. Don’t be shy, darling, ring the bell . . .
*****
Thanks to NetGalley and Baskerville for the advanced copy of this title in return for an honest review.
I have been sooooo excited to read this. It was all over Harrogate Crime Festival last year that I couldn’t wait.
It’s all very glamorous and luxurious and rich in detail and character and feeling. It’s got this rich (I can’t think of a better word for it), Golden Age feeling about it, even though it’s set in modern time. She’s got such a great sense of place and space and time and you immediately lose yourself in this world she’s created.
Given the hints in the synopsis I should have known, but I didn’t realise how smutty it would be. That’s not a bad thing, I like a bit of smut as much as the next person, and it really adds to this sumptuious-ness.
I read a lot of thrillers and a lot of whodunnits and they can get a bit samey, so it was nice to get something that gave me everything I expected but also had something a little bit different to keep it fresh.
The writing is so crisp and professional, it’s hard to believe this is her debut novel. This feels like it’s been crafted from years of experience.
I’m not a huge fan of big passages of dialogue, because I’m not very good at writing it. But the dialogue in this had a magical quality about it but somehow still manages to feel natural.
The hotel, the setting – they’re characters themselves, they participate in the story, they’re not just props. But at the same time they don’t overwhelm the “real” characters.
Concierge Sterling Lockwood is a fabulous protagonist. From page one she is a mysterious, glamorous, sultry, passionate, secretive, a powerful person and I was so ready to follow her story.
There are a lot of other characters – staff, guests, police – and some are given more airtime than others, but they’re all well written and well developed, letting us in their own story as well as their parts in the overall story.
I know it isn’t, but it has this feel of a fantasy novel about it, like I was expecting the hotel to be magic or for witches or fantasy creatures to appear. It’s magical.
What I found different with this book is that, for me anyway, it isn’t really about the murders or the investigation. It’s about Sterling, it’s about family and friendship and community, it’s about history ad secrets and fears, and it’s about the human spirit far more than it is about the whodunnit.
I won’t say what, just in case it doesn’t make the final copy, but at about 65% through there was a nice Easter Egg referencing three of my favourite thriller writers which made me smile.
I did NOT see the ending coming!
There’s a lot going on. A lot. Lots of subplots and characters, and at times I found it to be on the verge of too much, but I think she’s just about scaled it back enough to be interesting rather than overwhelming.
I’m not sure what I was actually expecting but it did surprise me at times, but it was thoroughly enjoyable and naughty and engrossing. A very promising debut indeed.
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