The Bird Hotel

The Bird Hotel (2023) is my first Joyce Maynard book, so I was pleasantly surprised to find that she has written a lot of books, and has been a regular columnist and reporter as well.

The Bird Hotel follows Irene, starting with her unusual childhood as the daughter of an itinerant singer in the late 1960s, taken along her mother’s travels cross-country, staying in tents or temporary living situations. Tragedy happens, and she is raised by her grandmother, both of them with new names. After her grandmother passes and Irene has put herself through art school, she falls in love with a truly wonderful man, though she never shares the secret of her childhood. The worst happens, again, and in her grief, and after contemplating suicide, Irene gets on a bus and travels south, finding luck and community where it is unexpected.

She lands in a small country in a small village called La Esperanza on a beautiful lake at the base of a volcano, at an aging hotel called La Llorona. The owner of the hotel takes her in, and she is comforted by the beauty of the gardens and the lake, the plethora of birds, and the food and drink provided by the woman who runs the hotel.

Soon Irene is unexpectedly running the hotel, and doing renovations, as she finds her way back to living. She has no desire to return, as the village of La Esperanza and the people there become her home.

Themes of betrayal, loss, and survival through everything that comes your way (both human-made and natural disasters) are central to the book, but there is also so much hope, as the name of the village symbolizes. Maynard’s writing is beautiful, and it made me want to go visit! (The author does writing retreats on Lake Atitlan in Guatemala!) I loved the community that Irene becomes a part of, and that she does overcome her long-set fears and the losses that she endured, over and over again. I thoroughly enjoyed the ride and loved that Maynard answered all of the lingering questions, down to the central loss of Irene’s life–that of her mother.

I listened to it as an audiobook, and I don’t recall any anti-fat bias so consider it weight-neutral. There were few descriptions of characters’ bodies.