Hattie Cotmore at Glamour Magazine shares her experience of meeting with our residential book butler.
“They have a ‘book butler’ at the in Cambridge,” A PR pal told me over lunch one day when she was updating me on her client list. “A ‘book butler’?! Oh my god, ” I lit up. “I would love to talk to her.”
My friend fills me in on the idea between forkfuls of spaghetti. “The book butler sits down with hotel guests so they can ask for recommendations on what to read during their stay.” I’m already picturing myself sitting at the hotel bar with a Penguin classic in one hand and a martini in the other.
I was a keen as a kid. I’d inhale books. I had the most vivid imagination, but also loved the accomplishment of turning the final page. At A Level and then university I found my reading-heavy courses deterred me from reading in my downtime. My relationship with reading has ebbed and flowed ever since. As an adult I’ve tried documenting on Good Reads, I have list upon list in my phone notes, I have a and I have Audible. But my relationship with books continues to fracture. In part, I blame the ‘Covid years’, in which my goal of twelve books a year (easy surely as I was stuck at home?) completely lost its way. It wasn’t long after this I joined and let’s BFFR, scrolling is probably to blame for my low attention span. I’m either reading every single day, or I won’t pick one up for months at a time. So, see a book butler? Yes, absolutely, count me in.