Yes, perhaps. On the surface, cultural appropriation does not quite make sense, as Maynard is writing essentially as herself – a white, female ex-pat running a hotel in a Central American country, drawing on her own experiences with her Guatemalan neighbors.
Could it be that publishers felt that Maynard’s novel – with its simplistic, fable-like stories – was reducing the people in that Central American community to stereotypes? Mostly positive ones, but still. I’m not accusing her of that – just throwing it out as a possibility.
VeryHappy’s opinion, tainted by the fact that I knew about Maynard’s affair with Salinger way back when and have never really liked her since then – in other words, ever:
The book was sloppy. I read the hard cover, so I have page numbers to reference:
Page 130 and 132: “Start of the fourth week at La Llorona”
Page 151: “In the 10 days since my arrival”
Page 147: Luis says re Gus: “He knows this property well and he works hard. We could use the help.”
Page 307: Luis says: “The senora found out [Gus] was cheating her”
Page 164: “Nobody could approach the crater except in the company of a guide.”
Page 206: “We decided to go alone up to the volcano.”
Page 244: “I thought back to other guests who’d availed themselves of Andres’s services, and the looks on their faces after.” No other guests were mentioned who used Andres.
Page 318: “Leila would have [seen through Gus and Dora].” Well, she actually did.
The different characters just felt like they were from short stories Maynard had written and just used as filler to make a whole book. They had nothing to do with the ultimate resolution of the plot – eg,
Harriet and Sam, the newly weds with Sam obsessed with the volcano
Helen and Jeff Boggs with their adopted daughter Sandra who met Sandra’s birth mother
Bud and Victoria Albertson – she was the one who was assaulted by Andres
Hank and Martha Purcell, from Darien CT and the pharma exec
These people had sort-of interesting tales to tell, but IMO they didn’t add anything to the plot or the main character or the book at all – other than length!!
I did not enjoy and would not recommend this book. (Could ya’ tell??)
@Veryhappy, I agree with much of what you wrote. I only posted about one timeline error, but like you, I noted others. @ignatius mentioned a particularly egregious one (about the impossibility of a soldier “visiting” Paris in spring 1944) that also had Amazon posters scratching their heads. And I noticed that the Lizard Men, carted off to jail in chapter 81, were referred to (in passing, as still present) in chapter 87. Where was Maynard’s editor?
I’ll give her a pass on the short story structure of the novel, since that standalone style was deliberate, per the info from @jerseysouthmomchess. However, in my opinion, the stories didn’t have a lot of nuance to them and didn’t really link thematically.
An Amazon reviewer gave a better answer to this question than I did:
The author’s comments at the end of the book were very unfortunate. There is a problem with Caucasian people telling the stories of black and brown people, especially when the Caucasian publishing gatekeepers don’t allow black and brown authors to tell those stories. The fact that one white character leaves her hotel to another white person, who she just knew a few days, versus the indigenous family who worked for her for years is fairly insulting. This author probably will never realize that sitting in her perch of privilege.
@oldmom4896 — thanks for posting the article about Joyce Maynard & her older sister in the random articles thread. They sure have had a complicated relationship.
I didn’t understand why she renamed the hotel , the Bird Hotel, there wasn’t a strong focus on birds in the book?
Then I read about her real hotel name, casa Paloma ( dove or pigeon) and, interesting how she makes sure her hotel is mentioned. Clever way to promote her hotel?
strong text These questions are from Joyce Maynard’s website.
THE BIRD HOTEL Book Review Questions:
For over 20 years, the author has had a house on Lake Atitlan in Guatemala where she goes to write as well as offer writing workshops. The country depicted in The Bird Hotel is fictional, but her actual home has both a lake and a volcano. What do you think inspired her to draw on this location for The Bird Hotel?
Question- was it Gus who killed the abusive fortune teller, not the husband ?
It’s never quite clear who did what to the Mayan creep who drugged and raped innocents. It could have been Gus or the husband who was in a rush to leave and no longer wanted to buy anything in the area.
My overall impression is that both Gus and the husband were involved. I vaguely remember someone reported seeing Gus and the husband heading to the ravine together with the fortune teller. As to who committed the act, I don’t know, but both were guilty in some way. I just couldn’t figure what Gus had to gain from the act. A payoff, maybe?
Gus was revealed as a “ bad guy” in his dealings with people, so when Maynard mentions “ Gus was seen heading to the ravine with the guy” it sounded like bad news for fortune teller ! ( he should have seen that coming )
The Lizard men, also, faced punishment as well. Maynard didn’t let the serpents get away with their abusive ways.
Gus had to have been getting a payoff. He would not take such a risk—especially to avenge a woman he doesn’t even know—without significant financial compensation. Here’s the passage where he drops a few hints:
I think Divine Retribution is part of the Magical Realism of the novel (or in this case, Magical Unrealism ). Gus and Dora have offended the gods by selfishly using the healing properties of the earth for profit. The volcano’s path of destruction makes it clear who is in the right and who is in the wrong.
I agree. Diana’s nomadic life and her “love the one you’re with” attitude did seem to capture that era. I liked the story about their aborted attempt to make it to Woodstock. (I also liked Daniel — one of the few decent men in the book.)
As the years go by, Irene continues to repeatedly mention hippies —“hippie travelers,” “the hippie circuit,” “hippie women,” etc., who appear in La Esperanza well into the 1980’s and 90’s. She has this comment around 2000 or so:
Hippie travelers passed through, adopting puppies and abandoning them three weeks later when they left for the next Rainbow Gathering.
It started to feel like an anachronism, but I don’t really know when the term “hippie” went out of style. I googled, “What is a modern word for ‘hippie’?” and the AI response was “Environmentalist.”
I went to undergrad in Eugene and grad school in Davis, CA. We respect environmentalists in those cities. It’s true I rarely hear the word hippie anymore.
I agree that likely both Gus and the poor husband of the raped women were involved and since Gus is pictured as so mercenary, I’m sure he received some payment for his “assistance.” He was made to be quite unlikeable.
I wondered about a few things in the novel that seemed intended to provide “local color” to the story, but left me more like this…
One was Leila’s burial. She dies quickly and gracefully – “her elegant form lay there on the grass, her long white curls fanned out around her head like a halo” (p. 155). And then:
It was dark when Luis carried her body back outside. In the moonlight, at the far end of the garden, Elmer had finished digging the hole. Where I had come from, there would have been paperwork to fill out, a medical examiner to call. Here in La Esperanza, people took care of their dead on their own.
By my calculation, this happens in 1993. I find it hard to believe that it was acceptable at that point in time to bury a body in your yard without paperwork, without notification of the authorities – without even a coffin. And her grave is never referred to again, despite the fact that it’s actually in the garden, and probably not terribly deep.
I would like to take a moment here to rant about body burials and body un-burials in novels. Digging a grave or digging up a grave are both very difficult tasks. Creating sufficient depth, keeping side dirt from filling back in as you dig, breaking up roots, moving stones, and shoveling out the dirt at the deepest point means arduous, time-consuming labor. At least 4-6 hours of back-breaking work. And yet in so many books, it’s a quick task. I’m not talking about shallow grave murder mysteries, I’m talking about “regular” novels, where it’s used to fulfill a necessary plot point (not naming them because it would mean spoilers).
Hmmm. It occurs to me that my husband might be worried if he checks my internet search because the last two inquiries were, “Can you bury a body in a yard without a coffin?” and “How long does it take to dig a grave by hand?”
That made me laugh- yes, your husband should worry, with those internet searches!
Just for the record, you have an avid CC fan base of witnesses for your defense, but maybe you should google search “ how to express my undying love to my beloved husband “ just to cover your tracks
Yes, @Mary13 so true. Also, liked the “sharing” between whoever you are with at the moment. I went with flow of everyone on the bus sharing whatever they had-- food, blanket, money. A nice, unselfish, communal living environment.
)
). Gus and Dora have offended the gods by selfishly using the healing properties of the earth for profit. The volcano’s path of destruction makes it clear who is in the right and who is in the wrong.
