Women’s Hotel by Daniel Lavery
Welcome to the Biedermeier. It’s shabbier (and much cheaper) than the Barbizon, but it’s still a respectable residential hotel where a professional single lady can establish herself in 1960s New York City. Women’s Hotel meanders between the Biedermeier’s fifteen floors, offering the reader glimpses into the lives and daily dramas of its quirky residents.
Perpetual AA member and first-floor manager Katherine spends much of her time settling her neighbors’ petty squabbles, from Moving Day to DIY haircuts to run-ins with the law. But when the hotel announces they will no longer be serving breakfast—a perk residents have enjoyed since 1929—even the unflappable Katherine can’t mediate the growing unrest among the Biedermeier’s longtime residents.
Women’s Hotel is essayist and humor writer Daniel Lavery’s first novel, but his knack for observation and historical detail make this an exceptionally strong debut. Infused with his signature gentle humor and period-perfect turns of phrase, Women’s Hotel transports the reader to an eclectic, bygone way of living.
Reviewed by Emma Radosevich, collection development librarian, Whatcom County Library System
(Originally published in Bellingham Alive June/July 2025 issue.)