RUNNING A HOTEL ON THE ROOF OF THE WORLD

Author Alec Le Sueur gathered five years of anecdotes--many of them laugh-out-loud funny--during his service as marketing manager of the Lhasa Holiday Inn in Tibet. Most deal with the inconveniences of everyday life and business due to cultural factors, the remote location, or the bureaucracy of the Chinese government. Christopher Scott handles Le Sueur's narrative ably, drawing laughs from his droll descriptions, but he is less successful with character voices, often sounding like ethnic stereotypes. This flaw emerges early, with a reading of an actual passage from a Chinese in-flight magazine in broken English. The book is generally entertaining but lacks coherence. Some stories, such as celebrity visits to his hotel, are only hinted at. J.A.S. © AudioFile 2000, Portland, Maine [Published: DEC/JAN 01]