The Hotel: A Series of ghost stories with a feminist twist

Nov 16, 2024 11:49 PM

Author:Daisy Johnson,Adjoa Andoh,Nicola Walker,Jessica Raine,Anne-Marie Duff,Maxine Peake,Juliet Stevenson,Sara Kestelman,Ronke Adékoluejo,Laurel Lefkow,Full cast

Fifteen highly original and darkly unsettling supernatural dramas, performed by some of Britain's finest actresses

'This is what we know about The Hotel. It is bigger on the inside than on the outside. Do not go into Room 63. Doors and windows do not stay in the same places. The Hotel listens when you speak. The Hotel watches... We'll be at The Hotel soon.'

A place of myths, rumours and secrets, The Hotel looms over the dark Fens, tall and grey in its Gothic splendour. Built on cursed land, a history of violent death suffuses its very foundations - yet it has a magnetism that is impossible to ignore.

On entering The Hotel, different people react in different ways. To some it is familiar, to others a stranger. Many come out refreshed, longing to return. But a few are changed forever, haunted by their time there. And almost all those affected are women...

Here are the stories of The Hotel: stories of children, mothers, monsters, cult film-makers, thrill-seekers and workers on the night shift, all with their own tales of its strange power, of the horrors of Room 63, and of desperate but failed attempts to escape its seductive pull.

Included are: The Hotel (read by Sara Kestelman); The Witch (read by Nicola Walker), The Build (read by Maxine Peake); Infestation (read by Anne-Marie Duff); Clean (read by Ronke Adékoluejo); The Wedding (read by Alexandria Riley); Conference (read by Jessica Raine); The Monster (read by Bettrys Jones); Night Watch (read by Anne-Marie Duff); Briony (read by Adjoa Andoh); Haunted (read by Laurel Lefkow); Mother (read by Rebecca Root); The Story (read by Juliet Stevenson); The Priest (read by Barbara Flynn) and The Film (read by Sara Kestelman).

Written by Daisy Johnson, one of Britain's best contemporary novelists and the youngest ever to be shortlisted for the Booker Prize, these deliciously chilling ghost stories will linger in your mind long after hearing.

Production credits

Written by Daisy Johnson

Produced by Justine Willett

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4, 20 September-27 December 2020

Reviews

Tremendous . . . fierce and funny

—— Sunday Times Books of the Year

Inspiring, liberating, hilarious and fascinating

—— Irish Times

So good, you'll want to read it twice

—— Sunday Independent

Beautifully observed . . . lyrical, funny and anguished

—— Guardian

It is a soul-bearing, brutally honest account of an extraordinary life

—— BBC Online

Fantastic . . . the way it's written is f**kin' beautiful . . . go out and get it

—— Blindboy Boatclub

Her voice on the page is as fearless, riveting and unforgettable as her voice in song. The cadence alone is hypnotic, her story essential. Rememberings is a must-read

—— Michael Stipe

Devastating, wise, hilarious and original

—— Róisín Ingle

A terrific book . . . absolutely brilliant

—— Brendan O'Connor

O'Connor gets you onside so completely with her direct narrative, you feel you could be in the same room as her

—— Sunday Times

Rememberings offers O'Connor's very personal version of events, a tale of maternal and institutional abuse that might be a misery memoir, if it weren't related with such eccentric charm and cheery fortitude

—— Daily Telegraph

From wild youth to troubled adulthood, this memoir is a blast of chaos

—— Times

Utterly brilliant

—— Paul Howard

Astonishing. Staggering

—— Rob Delaney

Superb . . . fantastic

—— Irish Daily Star

Beautifully written

—— VIP

Honest and illuminating

—— Irish Independent

Rememberings is an electrifying reminder of the importance of [O'Connor's] voice

—— Business Post

O'Connor brings everything to this memoir

—— Financial Times

Incendiary

—— i

Astonishingly good, wise and hilarious

—— Louise Nealon

Candid, open-hearted . . . a lot of self-deprecation, a lot of laughs, and a measure of honesty that would put most of us to shame

—— Anglo-Celt

Genuinely incredible . . . [Rememberings is] suffused with humour and forgiveness

—— Guardian

There's nothing conventional about Sinéad O'Connor and there's little conventional about her memoir either. . . She writes with searing honesty and plenty of wit

—— Independent

Her complicated life makes for riveting reading. From ripping up photographs of the Pope on prime time US television and her mental health struggles to a rollercoaster spiritual quest, she has never been afraid to be fearless

—— iNews

A deliciously decadent tale of sex, tragedy, celebrity, surfboards and tanned skin in 1980s Malibu.

—— The Times

I absolutely loved her book.... It's an absolute blast to read

—— Alice- Azania Jarvis

JACKIE COLLINS, BUT BETTER Sacrilege to say "better", I know, but there we are. Set in the 1980s, Taylor Jenkins Reid's Malibu Rising is wonderfully written, intensely evocative and concerns the model/ surfer children of a rock star. Tons of glamour, tons of sharply observed insights about sibling relationships, plus a massive party. Beach read par excellence. See also her brilliant Daisy Jones & the Six, which is heaven (more rock stars).

—— Anonymous

When we picked up Malibu Rising, the new novel by Taylor Jenkins Reid, we could barely put it down

—— That's Life

You'll never want this book to end, it will suck you in and spit you out!

—— Muddy Stilettos

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