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ABOUT THE BOOK
NO SPOILERSMarta Buchelli lives in the attic of the Hotel Balzaar with her mother Elena, who works there as a maid while a war rages somewhere beyond the hotel's walls. Marta's father, Thomas, has been gone for more than a year, and Marta has strict rules to follow: stay quiet, stay out of sight, touch nothing that isn't hers. Her days are spent going up and down the back stairs, studying a lobby painting of a one-winged angel she can never decide is arriving or leaving, and watching a clock where a carved cat forever chases a carved mouse. Everything changes when an eccentric old woman checks into room 314. She calls herself the countess, travels with a large green parrot named Blitzkoff, and calls Marta "my little ray of light," the very words her father used in his last letter. The countess promises to tell Marta a story, and then another, and soon Marta is climbing the back stairs each day to hear tales of a weeping general, a nun who paints visions of light, and a boy whose singing could put a king to sleep. There are seven stories in all, the countess says, and they must be told in the proper order.
Free Battle of the Books questions for The Hotel Balzaar
SPOILERSEvery one of these has the same answer, and that is the point. In a real battle the question is read aloud with a dozen other books in play, and students have a few seconds to place it. Here is what a battle might ask about The Hotel Balzaar. Use them as a quiz, a trivia round, or BOTB practice.
Where in the book they come from
- Early in the book
In what book does a girl keep an empty perfume bottle with a smiling mermaid on the label?
✓ Answer
The Hotel Balzaar by Kate DiCamillo
The mermaid has a green tail and yellow hair, with words in a language Marta cannot read curling around her. Marta puts the bottle on the dresser so the smiling face is the first thing she sees each morning, and once she opened it and smelled flowers and grass and light.
- First half
In what book do people crack open walnuts and find words of love and hope inside?
✓ Answer
The Hotel Balzaar by Kate DiCamillo
The parrot flies out over the circus audience and drops the caught nuts at their feet, and every shell holds a message that feels written just for that person. The general decides that comforting people this way may be a small way of atoning for the war.
- First half
In what book does a small door in a wall open onto a snowy rooftop?
✓ Answer
The Hotel Balzaar by Kate DiCamillo
Marta pulls the hidden knob, cold air rushes into the hallway, and she crawls through after Blitzkoff. Standing up on the roof with snow starting to fall is the first truly free moment she has had in the whole book.
- Second half
In what book does an old woman predict a girl will soon do jumping jacks and arithmetic?
✓ Answer
The Hotel Balzaar by Kate DiCamillo
Marta asks what happens once all seven stories have been told, and the countess teases that she will move on to more wholesome company. She waves off adding and subtracting as the small minded calculations of the world.
- Second half
In what book does a girl tuck a fox into bed with the covers up to his snout?
✓ Answer
The Hotel Balzaar by Kate DiCamillo
After eating the bread, the fox orders the girl to put him into her grandmother's bed, tuck him in like a child, and sing to him. He sleeps so deeply that he wakes with a thicker, glossier coat.
- Near the end
In what book does a girl find a guest's room empty with the bed made and the luggage gone?
✓ Answer
The Hotel Balzaar by Kate DiCamillo
Marta wakes in the dark sure that it is finally time for the seventh story and hurries down to the third floor. Finding the countess gone feels to her like having her heart pulled straight out of her chest.
