As we get to know the characters, many possible personal and political motives, ranging from petty to principled, come to light to explain the disappearance of the employee. The Sanatorium has all the elements of a page-turner: Plenty of plot twists, a varied cast of characters (and suspects), and an unnerving setting. On leave from her job as a detective, Elin musters her self confidence and leads an investigation to find the villain. Elin’s instincts about the eerie hotel are confirmed when a hotel employee goes missing and all clues point to an abduction. Meanwhile, a winter storm rages outside, and soon the hotel guests realize they’re stuck in the desolate, snowy landscape, with no way to leave or get help. Tension builds immediately as Elin remembers why she distanced herself from Isaac years before, and she and Will question whether to stay the weekend. Uncertain of herself and her future after multiple tragic events, Elin shakily reconnects with Isaac. “The more she looks the more she sees the tension, an anomaly.” Elin and her boyfriend, Will, have come to celebrate the engagement of her estranged brother, Isaac. When Elin Warner arrives, she immediately feels that there’s something deeply wrong with this place. “It’s as if time has taken over the building’s soul, left something rotten and diseased in its place.” Years later, it’s been turned into a luxury hotel, with medical equipment turned into museum pieces that create ambience. SummaryĪn isolated hotel in the Alps, The Sanatorium was once an institution for tuberculosis patients. The prologue creates such a sinister atmosphere that I put it down for a few days… until curiosity got the better of me, and I ended up devouring the rest of the book. I almost stopped reading this a few minutes into it. Standing there in front of the hotel she can feel the strangest thing, a disturbance in the air, a curious restlessness that has nothing to do with the falling snow.

The sanatorium a novel reviews