Who minds sleeping under a mosquito net when it's royally draped over the bed in a lush Kenyan, open-walled hut, fashioned from tree trunks and shielded from the sun by a sumptuous thatched roof? This selection of the most-splendid getaway havens nestled throughout the African continent is sure to please even the most finicky would-be voyagers. Photos.

A special 25th year anniversary edition of The Design Hotels™ Book presents an in-depth look at 25 boutique properties around the world that are changing the way we think about hospitality. For a quarter century, Design Hotels™ has been at the forefront of a movement in hospitality, curating a global collection of independent, design-driven hotels that function as social hubs and platforms for extraordinary experiences. In celebration of this benchmark, Design Hotels™ sent some of the world’s leading editorial and lifestyle photographers around the world to capture the unique character of 25 hotels at the vanguard of their hand-selected collection. Each hotel tells a story, rich with emotion and steeped in the history, culture, and nature of its local environment. The new, special edition of the brand’s wildly popular annual brings these stories to life through evocative photo essays and reportage. This edition of The Design Hotels™ Book is a distillation of a quarter century of pioneering design and original experiences, as well as a must-have for a worldwide community of travelers, likeminded in their pursuit of singular aesthetic environments, genuine local culture, and transformative, boundary-pushing travel experiences that defy conventional notions of luxury.

Now a major motion picture starring Jude Dench, Bill Nighy, Dev Patel, Tom Wilkinson, and Maggie Smith. When Ravi Kapoor, an overworked London doctor, reaches the breaking point with his difficult father-in-law, he asks his wife: “Can’t we just send him away somewhere? Somewhere far, far away.” His prayer is seemingly answered when Ravi’s entrepreneurial cousin sets up a retirement home in India, hoping to re-create in Bangalore an elegant lost corner of England. Several retirees are enticed by the promise of indulgent living at a bargain price, but upon arriving, they are dismayed to find that restoration of the once sophisiticated hotel has stalled, and that such amenities as water and electricity are . . . infrequent. But what their new life lacks in luxury, they come to find, it’s plentiful in adventure, stunning beauty, and unexpected love.

“Time travel, murder, corruption, restless baby dinosaurs, and a snarky robot named Ruby collide in this excellent, noir-inflected, humor-infused, science-fiction thriller.”—The Boston Globe An impossible crime. A detective on the edge of madness. The future of time travel at stake. From the author of The Warehouse . . . ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: NPR, Kirkus Reviews January Cole’s job just got a whole lot harder. Not that running security at the Paradox was ever really easy. Nothing’s simple at a hotel where the ultra-wealthy tourists arrive costumed for a dozen different time periods, all eagerly waiting to catch their “flights” to the past. Or where proximity to the timeport makes the clocks run backward on occasion—and, rumor has it, allows ghosts to stroll the halls. None of that compares to the corpse in room 526. The one that seems to be both there and not there. The one that somehow only January can see. On top of that, some very important new guests have just checked in. Because the U.S. government is about to privatize time-travel technology—and the world’s most powerful people are on hand to stake their claims. January is sure the timing isn’t a coincidence. Neither are those “accidents” that start stalking their bidders. There’s a reason January can glimpse what others can’t. A reason why she’s the only one who can catch a killer who’s operating invisibly and in plain sight, all at once. But her ability is also destroying her grip on reality—and as her past, present, and future collide, she finds herself confronting not just the hotel’s dark secrets but her own. At once a dazzlingly time-twisting murder mystery and a story about grief, memory, and what it means to—literally—come face-to-face with our ghosts, The Paradox Hotel is another unforgettable speculative thrill ride from acclaimed author Rob Hart.

INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER • From the bestselling author of Station Eleven and Sea of Tranquility, an exhilarating novel set at the glittering intersection of two seemingly disparate events—the exposure of a massive criminal enterprise and the mysterious disappearance of a woman from a ship at sea. “The perfect novel ... Freshly mysterious.” —The Washington Post Vincent is a bartender at the Hotel Caiette, a five-star lodging on the northernmost tip of Vancouver Island. On the night she meets Jonathan Alkaitis, a hooded figure scrawls a message on the lobby's glass wall: Why don’t you swallow broken glass. High above Manhattan, a greater crime is committed: Alkaitis's billion-dollar business is really nothing more than a game of smoke and mirrors. When his scheme collapses, it obliterates countless fortunes and devastates lives. Vincent, who had been posing as Jonathan’s wife, walks away into the night. Years later, a victim of the fraud is hired to investigate a strange occurrence: a woman has seemingly vanished from the deck of a container ship between ports of call. In this captivating story of crisis and survival, Emily St. John Mandel takes readers through often hidden landscapes: campgrounds for the near-homeless, underground electronica clubs, service in luxury hotels, and life in a federal prison. Rife with unexpected beauty, The Glass Hotel is a captivating portrait of greed and guilt, love and delusion, ghosts and unintended consequences, and the infinite ways we search for meaning in our lives. Look for Emily St. John Mandel’s bestselling new novel, Sea of Tranquility!

When George Washington embarked on his presidential tours of 1789-91, the rudimentary inns and taverns of the day suddenly seemed dismally inadequate. But within a decade, Americans had built the first hotels--large and elegant structures that boasted private bedchambers and grand public ballrooms. This book recounts the enthralling history of the hotel in America--a saga in which politicians and prostitutes, tourists and tramps, conventioneers and confidence men, celebrities and salesmen all rub elbows. Hotel explores why the hotel was invented, how its architecture developed, and the many ways it influenced the course of United States history. The volume also presents a beautiful collection of more than 120 illustrations, many in full color, of hotel life in every era. Hotel explores these topics and more: · What it was like to sleep, eat, and socialize at a hotel in the mid-1800s · How hotelkeepers dealt with the illicit activities of adulterers, thieves, and violent guests · The stories behind America’s greatest hotels, including the Waldorf-Astoria, the Plaza, the Willard, the Blackstone, and the Fairmont · Why Confederate spies plotted to burn down thirteen hotels in New York City during the Civil War · How the development of steamboats and locomotives helped create a nationwide network of hotels · How hotels became architectural models for apartment buildings · The pivotal role of hotels in the civil rights movement