#BlogTour Dolly Considine's Hotel by Eamon Somers

 It's a pleasure to take part in the BlogTour Dolly Considine's Hotel by Eamon Somers.

About the Author

Eamon Somers was born and grew up in inner city Dublin. He was a campaigner and spokesperson for Ireland’s fledgling lesbian and gay rights movement in the early 1980s. During the economic downturn he was made redundant and, having moved to London, spent two years working in Haringey’s Lesbian and Gay Unit until Clause 28 and Council Tax cuts sent him into the charity housing sector where he continues to work.

Eamon’s story Spring in the Country won the Carmarthen short story  competition sponsored by BBC Wales. Other stories have been published in Chroma, Tees Valley Writer, and ABC Tales. Eamon is a graduate of the certificate in creative writing at Birckbeck College London - the forerunner of the current MA. He is the father of three wonderful children. He and his Civil Partner (Tomás) are very proud of their three-year-old grandson Daragh. 

Follow @mustbeeamon on Twitter, Visit eamonsomers.com

About the book

Julian Ryder (aka Paddy Butler) is an eighteen-year-old aspiring writer fleeing a life unlived. Dolly McClean (née Considine) is knee-deep in running a hotel populated by family secrets and Irish republicans. They seem to have little in common – until Julian rescues Dolly's barmaid-cum-cleaner from a supposed IRA thug. It doesn’t take long for him to embroil himself in the gossip of the bar and the guests’ bedsheets. Dolly and her entourage quickly become fodder for his literary ambitions and soon it becomes impossible to extricate reality from fantasy...

Moving fluidly between the 1950s of Dolly’s youth and Julian’s 1980s summer of unrequited love, Irish recession and emigration, the hotel becomes a stage for farce and tragedy. As statues give birth to fully grown men while swordwielding Irish dancers perform for party politicians, Julian’s fictions, Dolly’s secrets and political intrigue threaten to tear them and Ireland itself apart in the run up to the Pro-life Constitutional Amendment of September 1983.

Review

Okay, there is a lot to unpack here and unfortunately I can't do that to the extent I would like to because it would spoil the read for others. I absolutely think this is the kind of story readers return to and in doing so discover hidden nuances and perhaps parts of the story that flow quietly alongside, whilst the other storylines and characters march pounding through the pages.

One of those marchers, rebels, voices of resistance and change, is of course Dolly herself. A woman, much like many other in the world, who is defined by what profits and pleasures others, as opposed to the changes she is trying to invoke. Take away the hotel for instance and make Dolly a 24/7 stay at home mammy who has played her part in political change or skirmishes, and you will find she will always be defined by the term mammy and housewife. It's this inequality of perception due to gender, well it really burns and enrages Dolly. Just how much, and what type of hardened steel she is made of, is evident in the last few chapters

The story itself is an interesting conundrum of fact, fiction, truths and misconceptions. No matter who takes on the role of narrator they are usually unreliable. With a wee bit of a Hotel New Hampshire vibe, which is taken up a notch to mirror the political hot cauldron of the times, the story also questions the boundaries of artistic licence.

Somers delivers a deep multi-layered piece with an avant-garde approach when it comes to the style. I enjoyed it. I have left my review blank of the majority of details, so readers can experience it as unbiased as possible.

Buy Dolly Considine's Hotel at Amazon Uk or go to Goodreads for any other retailer. Publisher ‏: ‎ Unbound Digital pub date 8 July 2021. Buy at Amazon com.