The characters are interesting, likable, and a bit mysterious. But, why not? It’s a mystery, right? On the sixth floor, the doors of the service elevator opened. A hotel employee appeared with a breakfast tray and made his way to Room 622.

The Enigma of Room 622 – HarperCollins The Enigma of Room 622 – HarperCollins

Then, I read The Final Days of our Fathers, and the Baltimore Boys, and the Disappearance of Stephanie Mailer...and with each book, I wondered: “ Is this author actually overrated?”. The only thing enjoyable was reading about Bernard de Fallois. I just wished I didn’t have to read it an egocentric story, with a far-fetched ending that gave me the same bitter taste as the Lost tv show ending. As to what happened on that fateful day, and the identity of that corpse ... readers must wait a long, long while until those are revealed. Macaire, meanwhile, does not greatly impress with his bank-work -- and especially in the year leading up to the murder seems to have been neglecting many of his duties.I sighted more reading this book than I did reading the incomprehensible assembly instructions of my Ikea BRIMNES bed.

The Enigma of Room 622: A Novel - Joël Dicker - Google Books

Macaire's father was impressed by Lev and offered him a position at the bank -- despite Lev having no professional training or higher education. Yes, I know I mentioned this just above, but that “book within a book” thing was a bit confusing for me at first. The author’s name as a character of the book as well? I couldn’t quite wrap my head around that before I started reading the book. Was it fiction or an autobiography of some sort? But, I soon got into the rhythm of the story and this no longer bothered me. However, I think some of the issues are due to a poor translation which you can’t blame the author for. There are some fairly good twists towards the end although you have to wait a long time for them but at least they are unpredictable. Unfortunately they’re not sufficiently dynamic for me to raise the rating . Scarletta Leonas, another guest at the hotel, discovers that the reason there’s no Room 622 is that an unsolved murder has occurred. She begins working with Joël as a sort of assistant and the two amateur sleuths attempt to establish the sequence of the events leading up to the weekend of the murder. They speak to many of those involved, and slowly put together the picture of what happened the night of the murder.He chooses the Hotel de Verbier in the Swiss Alps as his sanctuary, a fancy luxury resort where hospitality comes above everything else. Needless to say, what promises to be an idyllic vacation leading to recovery becomes anything but that, and it all starts with a rather peculiar detail: there is no room 622 at the hotel. Even the promise, at one point: "I'll explain" is immediately followed by: "It's more complicated than that".

The Enigma of Room 622” by Joel Dicker - Bookwormex “The Enigma of Room 622” by Joel Dicker - Bookwormex

The first would be the setting. The setting of the book is mostly Geneva and Verbier, Switzerland. I have been to Switzerland more than once, so I’m somewhat familiar with the vibe there already. But this book made me really imagine walking the streets of Geneva and wondering about all those secret international banking laws – something I’ve always been fascinated by. And the Verbier setting made me imagine myself skiing in the Alps and enjoying a wonderful apres-ski. Por momentos se me hacía aburrido, mucha información sin llegar a ningún lado (o avanzando pero muy lentamente). Last but not least, reading this book and consequently writing the review forced me to learn how to type the two dots over the ë like this ë. You never know when you’ll learn something useful like that! Thanks, Joël 🙂 The Enigma of Room 622 – What I Didn’t Like Sí, ya me he dado cuenta que no ha querido escribir una novela negra, sino más bien una novela de suspense inglés, más ligera, pero no hacía falta hacerlo de un modo tan chabacano, con ese tono como de novelita barata donde todo vale. He bluffed that he was a Romanov, which kept Anastasia's mother happy for a time, but of course his actual identity was eventually exposed -- and readers know that she wound up with Macaire.Being simultaneously a little too perfect and a little too rife with mystery, I found the Verbier to have made the perfect setting for The Enigma of Room 622. Lush in its decor and populated by a wide cast of eccentric guests and idiosyncratic staff members, it feels like there’s always something of import happening somewhere, and always someone plotting something from the shadows. Ultimately, it feels like an outlandish setting, the only kind which could have allowed for the proper development of the novel’s plot. Como en la mayoría de thrillers un asesinato sin resolver es la trama, cualquiera de los personajes puede ser el asesino, pero, en este caso, como si estuviéramos jugando a un complicado Cluedo, también cualquiera de ellos puede ser la víctima, ya que hasta bien pasada la mitad del relato no se desvela quién es el asesinado. Me ha llamado la atención que, lejos de grandes giros, la historia va retorci��ndose sobre si misma y, sin que apenas te des cuenta, tu propia percepción de los personajes va cambiando. And then the translation, the use of terms that we dont use anymore in the Italian language. There is also a whining tone, that I observe in other books, especially the previous one, The Disappearance of Stephanie Mailer.

Mysteries: Joël Dicker’s ‘The Enigma of Room 622’ - WSJ

The environment itself in which the story takes place also reinforces the ridiculous aspect of the atmosphere, depicting a world which seems to look like our own, but a few notches more colourful and prone to improbable coincidences. Being more specific, the hotel itself feels like it was pulled from some different realm into our world. Adónde van los muertos? A todos los lugares en donde podemos recordarlos. Sobre todo a las estrellas. Porque no dejan de seguirnos, bailan y brillan en la oscuridad de la noche justo encima de nuestras cabezas”.

More time is dedicated to the murder in the past, which was a bit of a disappointment since the ‘today’ story is more interesting than the murder in the past. The wealthy private bank family machinations of the earlier murder seem unrealistic, bland and contrived, like having a complex plot explained to you after a movie leaves you totally befuddled. Adding to the mystery of the story, there was sort of a “book within a book” element. This was a bit confusing to me at first. But it worked well as part of the story. Unfortunately, it was Lev that caught Anastasia's eye -- a lowly hotel employee at the time, rather than a wealthy banker. He writes that when, after two months, the affair came to an abrupt end he decided he needed a break he headed off to Verbier -- a place Bernard was also fond of. He has an excuse -- but not one he can reveal: for twelve years he's been living a double-life, working as a secret agent for: "P-30, a section within the Department of Defence financed by a secret account, which was virtually unknown -- including to the powerful parliamentary intelligence committee -- and which reported directly to the Federal Council".