For fans of Downton Abbey and The Crown … welcome to Hotel Portofino, where romance, revelry, and intrigue await.
Hotel Portofino is now a six-episode TV series that began airing on PBS on May 19, 2022.
A heady historical drama about a British family who open an upper-class hotel on the magical Italian Riviera during the Roaring Twenties
Hotel Portofino has been open for only a few weeks, but already the problems are mounting for its owner Bella Ainsworth. Her high-class guests are demanding and hard to please. And she’s being targeted by a scheming and corrupt local politician, who threatens to drag her into the red-hot cauldron of Mussolini’s Italy.
To make matters worse, her marriage is in trouble, and her children are still struggling to recover from the repercussions of the Great War. All eyes are on the arrival of a potential love match for her son Lucian, but events don’t go to plan, which will have far-reaching consequences for the whole family.
Set in the breathtakingly beautiful Italian Riviera, Hotel Portofino is a story of personal awakening at a time of global upheaval and of the liberating influence of Italy’s enchanting culture, climate, and cuisine on British “innocents abroad.”
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“This book will likely become another hit period drama series for PBS in 2022, after its British launch last year, and it will be no surprise to anyone who listens to the audio version of this book…The period evokes the style of Downton Abbey with the charm and warmth of the Italian coast. With so many characters, it takes a great voice actor to help listeners keep them straight. Esther Wane does just this with a delightful British accent as well as dialects that are appropriate for the characters. Highly recommended.”
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Library Journal (starred audio review)