Art Hour at the Duchess Hotel (Sophie Green, Hachette)

Art Hour at the Duchess Hotel introduces four women who find themselves at the glamorous Duchess Hotel on the picturesque Mornington Peninsula in Victoria in 1999. We first meet Joan, who abandons everything to reconnect with her previous self and regain her passion for painting. She meets Frances, an almost 80-year-old who still hasn’t come to terms with losing the love of her life during the Second World War, and the two women start painting together. Soon enough, Kirrily, a hotel staff member, joins the painting sessions to escape her tiresome life. Finally, Alison, Frances’s seemingly least preferred child, enters the group to forget about her own family problems. Through each of the women’s voices, Green (The Inaugural Meeting of the Fairvale Ladies Book Club) writes in a slow-paced, conversational tone that invites us to philosophise about life’s what-ifs. Even Green’s secondary characters, like quirky bartender Shane, contribute to this discussion. Grief, friendship, remorse, marriage, motherhood, self-discovery, lust and love are strongly depicted in the novel. However, at the book’s core lies the revelation of what belonging truly means and how coming together can change lives. Almost as if a self-help book metamorphosed into a fictional form, Art Hour at the Duchess Hotel will make a great book club pick and will appeal mostly to women aged 30+, particularly fans of Elizabeth Strout’s Lucy by the Sea, Meg Bignell’s The Angry Women’s Choir, and Joanna Nell’s Mrs Winterbottom Takes A Gap Year.

Books+Publishing reviewer: Nadia Heisler is a CALD (culturally and linguistically diverse) writer originally from Brazil with a background in journalism. Books+Publishing is Australia’s number-one source of pre-publication book reviews.

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