Hotels of North America

Couched in the form of a series of introspective and oblique reviews of disparate hotels and inns by the mysterious Reginald Edward Morse, suitably prefaced by the improbable director of a society of hoteliers and innkeepers, and with an afterword by none other than Rick Moody himself, Hotels of North America is a tour de force, a virtual Audubon of loneliness. Accompanied most frequently by his companion, K., who takes on the names of various birds as cover, Reginald records the thoughts that trouble him whilst staying in temporary lodgings. That these thoughts rarely have much to do with the actual establishments is hardly a criticism. Reginald’s fame, if Internet reviews constitute a substantive basis for fame, is due to his show more ruminations on his sad life, his failed marriage, his sexual fiascos, his occupation as an erstwhile motivational speaker (freelance), and his love for K. Sometimes funny, sometimes sad, sometimes acting entirely inappropriately, Reginald exists through the two years in which he contributes his online reviews and then, apparently, disappears as though he had never been. All that we are left with — all that “Rick Moody” is left with having been asked to write the afterword — are the reviews themselves, as though a sequence of extended opinions, rants, and ruminations could constitute a man. A man, quite literally, of words.

It is a fascinating performance. Moody sustains the dim illusion with grace and pathos, showing real care for his creation even when Morse reveals himself to be largely unlikeable. The writing, which is naturally first-person and confessional, matches Morse’s character perfectly, with bathetic language and idiosyncratic points of interest. This is not a series of one-off comic turns. It is a deeply considered whole, so bleak in some respects as to be potentially tragic. And yet the archness of the performance, the all-too-obvious framing for apparent verisimilitude, demands that the reader look closer, or perhaps stand further back to see what is really being accomplished here. I’m still pondering that.

Highly recommended. show less

It's Trip Advisor sprung to life - melancholy life for sure, but hilariously entertaining and affecting, all wrapped up in a meta package. The author plays (or does he?) Reginald Edward Morse, top reviewer for RateYourLodging.com, where in no chronological order, he decimates anywhere but home. Even if home is a car sometimes. Morse has a wife, ex-wife, two lovers, and a daughter, and each drift in and out of his life in various hotels, motels, empty storefronts, and one B&B. Included are descriptions of both the stunningly repulsive Capri Whitestone, Bronx, NY, and the equally repellent President's City Inn of Quincy, MA -both ground zero for hordes of richly described bedbugs.

In stupendous Babbitry, the preface by Greenway Davies, he show more of the notorious interchangeable-first-and-last-names club for men, and Director, North American Society of Hoteliers and Innkeepers, warns you of what you'll find within. If you don't chortle with delight, stay home. show less

When you enter the negative universe of Rick Moody's "Hotels of North America," remember you are walking the same path Jonathan Swift took with "Gulliver's Travels," and J.P. Donleavy's "The Ginger Man." That way, when you read the hilarious scatalogical adventures of Reginald Edward Morse you won't stop at the political incorrectness. The "hero" of this novel, the unreliable narrator, disburthens himself of his adventures in hotels across the USA, throwing in a few in Europe for good measure. The book is structured as a set of online hotel reviews (mostly bad) but the author intrudes with his sexual escapades, criminal activities, and general misbehaviour. As Moody explains in his metafictional "Afterward" the story is as much about show more aloneness, the feeling of being separate as anything else. For Morse, being separate gives him the license for misbehaviour. Morse is a cad and a creep. His quasi-reviews make us wonder a bit more about the people whose reviews we actually read on TripAdvisor (me included). I'm sure there is a "Morse" Code, maybe a cynical man's da Vinci Code, and it could take some time to find it. Moody puts the pretentious on trial, the hotels and motels that try to deliver a retail experience and why we fall for them. A hotel stay is a peculiar form of reality we adore because we too are pretentious. Home is not good enough for many of us so we crucify our homes as dull and boring. We look for "reality" on TV. What drove this home for me was the very funny passage on the porn channels that can be found on the TV sets of "family" hotels. Porn is the antithesis of home. Destructive. Disgusting. Moronic. And a big time profit centre for hoteliers. Go figure. show less

An odd book about dislocation and loneliness, told through a series of hotel reviews. At first, it was humorous and thought-provoking but then grew darker and more thought-provoking. An interesting premise, and I didn't hate it but a little went a long way.

Quite fabulous, quite funny but also heart-rending.

Hotels of North America is very much a novel of our time—the time when people give more credence to the opinions of strangers on Yelp, Amazon, and Rotten Tomatoes—than to professional critics and reviewers. In this world that is constantly being reviewed online comes Reginald Edward Morse, or R.E. Morse, one of the top reviewers at RateYourLodging.com.

The book opens with a preface by Greenway Davies of a national association of hoteliers and ends with an afterword by the author, Rick Moody, creating the conceit that this is a collection of online hotel reviews submitted by Morse from January 2012 to March 2014. The hotel reviews are from different dates – going far back into the past, a nonlinear exploration of the hotels (and show more parking lots) at key moments in time, or more accurately, moments of intense emotion.

It is a sad story of a sad, lonely man filled with regret, remorse, even. There is a chapter on missing his daughter that wrecks the heart. Morse is acquainted with despair and loneliness, but there is something plucky about him, too, this man making a career out of motivational speaking when he is not very successful himself. He just keeps trying and sometimes finding delight and certainly finding a collaborator that suits him, the mysterious K. with whom he adulterates his marriage. Morse is down on his luck, a failure at high finance and yet he keeps plugging along, traveling all over, staying in so many hotels, some even more down on their luck than Morse.

Read the rest on my web site: https://tonstantweaderreviews.wordpress.com/2016/01/28/hotels-of-north-america-b... show less

Moody takes an intriguing premise--a series of hotel reviews--and turns it into an engaging, somewhat amusing, but ultimately minor tale of one man's struggle to find himself--mostly through his relationship with his ex-wife, lovers, and his daughter. Occasionally there are funny things about hotels as well. A lot of the properties discussed here are real; you'll be Googling them to see which are which. The setup also gives Moody a chance to review his own book at the end, which is also sort of amusing. I guess what I'm trying to say with this review is: This is a fun read, but doesn't leave you with a lot of lasting impressions. Moody writes well, but there isn't too much here beyond a typical middle-aged longing for some sort of show more permanence. This is a book to borrow from the library (as I did) rather than pay the $25 cover price for something you will never pick up again. show less