Book Review: A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles

A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles
Narrator: Nicholas Guy Smith
Published by Penguin Books on September 6, 2016
Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction
Pages: 466
Length: 17 hrs and 52 mins
Format: Audiobook
Goodreads

Alternate cover editions for ASIN B01COJUEZ0 can be found here, here, and here.
From the New York Times bestselling author of Rules of Civility, a novel about a man who is ordered to spend the rest of his life inside a luxury hotel—a beautifully transporting novel.
In 1922, Count Alexander Rostov is deemed an unrepentant aristocrat by a Bolshevik tribunal, and is sentenced to house arrest in the Metropol, a grand hotel across the street from the Kremlin. Rostov, an indomitable man of erudition and wit, has never worked a day in his life, and must now live in an attic room while some of the most tumultuous decades in Russian history are unfolding outside the hotel’s doors. Unexpectedly, his reduced circumstances provide him entry into a much larger world of emotional discovery.
Brimming with humor, a glittering cast of characters, and one beautifully rendered scene after another, this singular novel casts a spell as it relates the count’s endeavor to gain a deeper understanding of what it means to be a man of purpose.

This has easily been one of my top 5 reads of 2025.

I jumped into it without knowing much of the story. I wanted to read something about friendship, and after several searches, I narrowed my choice down to this book. As I mentioned, I didn’t know much about it, and when I looked at the cover, I wondered repeatedly if I wanted to read a book about a man written by another man (I’m lately inclined to read more about female and non-binary authors to broaden my horizons). I have to say that A Gentleman in Moscow has pleasantly surprised me, to the point of becoming one of my favorite books of all time.

This book is about an aristocrat who, after the Russian Revolution, is confined to the Metropol Hotel. At first, Count Rostov may not seem a very interesting or likable main character, but the beauty of this story lies in how a clear narrowing of his spaces triggered a transformation and broadened his life. A Gentleman in Moscow is a tale of friendship, of happiness found in the little things and unexpected everyday places, in people whom we initially overlooked, but who soon change our lives. While this is a story of transformation and growth, I must also mention how artfully Towles has chosen the perfect words to narrate this story in a prose that is almost palatable and hypnotic.

I listened to the audio version, which was exquisitely narrated by Nicholas Guy Smith, and was the perfect match for this beautifully told story.

Amor Towles is the executive producer of a series by the same name, starring Ewan McGregor, that, although it skims through parts of the story, is worth watching.