The Third Hotel by Laura Van Den Berg
The Third Hotel by Laura Van Den Berg...how do I start? It’s intriguing without being stressful. It’s succinctness makes it a non-committal read. You don’t have time to stop and ponder about the symbolism in a scene; Van Den Berg’s characters overlook curiosities that could contribute to a greater meaning, and the reader is distracted just as the characters are. By the time the protagonist's sanity is questioned by readers, reality and fantasy have already been woven together.
Clare is boring, and that’s how she prefers it. She works as a sales rep for a company that designs elevators, and travels frequently for her job. On the road, her greatest pleasure is to turn off all the lights, sit naked on the scratchy polyester comforter, and count the breaths as they leave her body. Her husband, Richard, doesn’t understand that.
Richard studies film, specifically, the genre of horror. He is fascinated by motive, mortality, the physiological response to fear. In the last year of their marriage, Richard begins acting strange. He starts going on nightly walks. He develops a new fear of dogs. His voice changes.
Unbeknownst to Clare, her private and taciturn behavior breeds resentment in Richard. Communication between the two degrades. He desperately pleads to restore the language once easily shared between them. She doesn’t understand what he wants.
One night, Richard is struck by a car and left to die on the side of the road. The only thing he was carrying was a white box, taped shut, which Clare’s is given at the hospital when she identifies his body. They won’t ever get the chance to finish that conversation, or their relationship.
A grieving Clare journeys to the verdant island of Cuba to conclude her husband’s work. The two were planning to attend a horror film festival together in Havana. The white box is nestled in her suitcase, still taped shut. Clare hopes to gain closure from the trip- and finds anything but.
She sees Richard standing outside El Museo de Revolución, dressed in linen clothes that she’s never seen before. He languidly strolls near the sea wall, as if he hasn’t been dead for two months. Chasing him through Havana, hiding in the closet of his rented room while he sleeps, Clare is desperate to know what happened to the man she loved. Perhaps for Richard, watching intimacy mutate into isolation was more terrifying than any horror on screen.
The novel replays Clare’s recent past and far-repressed memories, alongside the contemporary events of the plot. Where most authors would struggle with convoluted timelines, Van Den Berg provides clear continuity of the narrative.
Clare’s life has always been suspended in impermanence- her parents operated a motel in Florida, where revolving guests never stayed for long. As an adult, she finds comfort in the impersonal nature hotel rooms. She can’t stop thinking about a fingernail left in a drawer, the small half-moon undisturbed, yet waiting to be claimed.
Van Den Berg uses Clare’s indifference to render her an objective narrator. In this way, Van Den Berg is able slip feminist criticisms into the stream of consciousness writing, without centering them to the plot. Despite being a vessel for apathy, Clare’s pointed thoughts allude to her feminist ideals:
“What was it about men and humiliation? Was humiliation supposed to be any easier for women to take? She didn’t think so, even though the world kept insisting they were built for it.” (101)
I liked the novel more than I thought I would. Certain quirks that would otherwise be frustrating, like dialogue sans quotes or two page chapters, were tolerated because of the unique style of Van Den Berg’s writing. I picked up The Third Hotel at Half-Priced Books, and was pleasantly surprised when I opened it up to see that it was signed by the author. There were plenty on the shelf, go get yourself a copy.
