I was very sceptical when I read Anton du Beke's first novel One Enchanted Evening about the Buckingham Hotel during the 1930s but was very pleasantly surprised. Again when I started reading Moonlight Over Mayfair, I thought that this would just be a retelling of the same story about life in a large London hotel and again I have been proved wrong.
I love his characters. Anton has obviously researched the issues of the period when this book was set and managed to weave several different storylines into his book - not just the politics at the time but also the issue of drug addiction, racialism, homophobia etc. Of course, the introduction into the UK of jazz and the new dances from the USA are perfectly in keeping with the era.
The main protagonist, Raymond de Guise, who is the principal dancer in the Grand ballroom of the hotel and the hero of this story is a thinly disguised portrayal of Anton himself.
In some ways, I was hoping for a different and sadder ending as it would have assured a third book in the series.
But, hopefully, Anton is already hard at work writing the sequel!
I love his characters. Anton has obviously researched the issues of the period when this book was set and managed to weave several different storylines into his book - not just the politics at the time but also the issue of drug addiction, racialism, homophobia etc. Of course, the introduction into the UK of jazz and the new dances from the USA are perfectly in keeping with the era.
The main protagonist, Raymond de Guise, who is the principal dancer in the Grand ballroom of the hotel and the hero of this story is a thinly disguised portrayal of Anton himself.
In some ways, I was hoping for a different and sadder ending as it would have assured a third book in the series.
But, hopefully, Anton is already hard at work writing the sequel!