Winterhouse is just the sort of fantasy mystery adventure story that I like. The setting is a luxurious hotel with lots of long, twisty halls and secret, locked rooms and exciting amenities, including, of course, a huge library full of old books. The plot is filled with coded messages and puzzles and late night adventures and unusual friendships. The protagonist is an orphan girl, Elizabeth Sommers, who loves to read, so lots of literary allusions. The cast of supporting characters includes the hotel proprietor, the mysterious Norbridge Falls, a friendly librarian named Leona Springer, Elizabeth’s new friend, Freddy Knox, and various other assorted villains, friends, and eccentric minor cast members.
In the story, the poor orphan girl, who lives with her unkind and neglectful aunt Purdy and Uncle Burlap, is unexpectedly whisked away by unknown benefactors to Winterhouse Hotel for the Christmas holidays. While Elizabeth is enjoying the hotel and all its charms—the library, ski slopes, an over-sized jigsaw puzzle, concerts, lectures, and more—she becomes aware that there is mystery and even danger lurking behind the happy facade of Winterhouse. With the reluctant help of the unadventurous but inventive Freddy, Elizabeth sets out to uncover the secrets of Winterhouse before those secrets overcome the goodness and cheer of the old hotel and its guests.
Yes, it’s a perfect set-up. But the execution wasn’t quite up to par. The dialogue and the actions of the main characters, Elizabeth and Freddy, were strained and sometimes unnatural. Norbridge Falls’s actions and particularly his speech patterns are mysterious and unpredictable, too, and I never understood why he was acting so secretive, eccentric, and strange. The author left a lot of loose ends and unanswered questions hanging, perhaps in view of a possible sequel to this debut novel, but it felt like a violation of the Chekov’s gun adage: “if in Act I you have a pistol hanging on the wall, then it must fire in the last act.” Why were the two jigsaw puzzlers, Mr. Wellington and Mr. Rajput (and their wives), included in the story? What was the significance of introducing them and their huge Himalayan temple puzzle into the plot? Who is Riley Sweth Granger, and where did The Book come from? What really happened to Elizabeth’s parents? Why are Freddy’s allegedly distant and hateful parents suddenly interested in spending time with him at Winterhouse? What is the significance of the Flurschen candy? Why do most of the women of the Falls family live to be exactly 100 years old?
Although some mysteries are resolved by the end of the book, these and many other questions that I had are left unanswered. I think the author may eventually hit his stride and give us some delightful middle grade fiction in the vein of The Westing Game and The Mysterious Benedict Society, but Winterhouse does read like a first attempt. It’s worth reading, though, if only for the allusions to Anne-with-an-e and Narnia and Westing Game and other similar classics. And the library. The library in Winterhouse is to swoon for!
Oh, and the illustrations in the book by Chloe Bristol are pitch-perfect, or pen-perfect. Enjoy the pictures and the puzzles and the bookishness. I’d say give it a chance, and perhaps look forward to the next book in a projected trilogy, The Secrets of Winterhouse, to be published in 2019. Perhaps I’ll get answers to some of my questions then.
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This book may be nominated for a Cybils Award, but the views expressed here are strictly my own and do not reflect or determine the judging panel’s opinions.
