The White Octopus Hotel by Alexandra Bell

Book Description

London, 2015. When reclusive art appraiser Eve Shaw shakes the hand of a silver-haired gentleman in her office, the warmth of his palm sends a spark through her.

His name is Max Everly—curiously, the same name as Eve’s favorite composer, born one hundred sixteen years prior. And she has the sudden feeling that she’s held his hand before . . . but where, and when?

The White Octopus Hotel, 1935. In this belle époque building high in the snowy mountains, Eve and a young Max wander the winding halls, lost in time.

Each of them has been through the trenches—Eve through a family accident and Max on the battlefields of the Great War—but for an impossible moment, love and healing are just a room away . . . if only they have the courage to step through the door.

Review

As a scuba diver, I have a soft spot for octopuses. They’re intelligent, curious, and just strange enough to feel magical. Whether I’m watching one disappear into a crack in a reef or encountering one in fiction, I’m always intrigued.

That made The White Octopus Hotel an easy book to pick up. Part time travel, part mystery, and part romance, it seemed to have it all. But what surprised me was how deeply it explored grief.

At its heart, The White Octopus Hotel is about loss, regret, and the temptation to rewrite the moments that shape our lives. Eve carries a wound that has defined her for years, and when she discovers an opportunity to revisit the past, she becomes determined to change what happened.

Grief and Second Chances

Like Cassandra in Reverse, The White Octopus Hotel explores the desire to undo painful moments. But the two books are interested in very different questions. While Cassandra in Reverse ultimately centers on self-acceptance, The White Octopus Hotel asks whether removing our greatest losses would also erase the life we’ve built because of them.

Bell handles the speculative elements with a surprisingly light touch. The story emphasizes the emotional consequences rather than the time-travel mechanics. This allows the novel to focus on grief, forgiveness, and the complicated relationship between suffering and growth.

The hotel itself is wonderfully dreamlike. Rooms shift and time bends. The lines between memory and reality blur. It left me slightly untethered, but my uncertainty mirrored Eve’s reality, making the experience immersive.

I loved the novel’s refusal to offer simple answers. It forces you to sit with a difficult truth: even the events we wish had never happened become part of who we are.

Readers who enjoy speculative fiction that uses unusual premises to explore grief, regret, and second chances will probably find The White Octopus Hotel a thoughtful, memorable read.

Content Warning

Child death, Death, Grief, Injury, Self-harm, War

The header photo is a composite image. Base image by Antonia Lombardi on Unsplash