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Interviews / Summer Reading / Santa Monica Hotels / Gabe Rotter / → All Tags

Shutters on the Beach Makes a Cameo In New Thriller Read, The Human Bobby

In need of a good read this Labor Day Weekend? One of our VIP hotel reviewers (and disclosure, a close friend of HotelChatter), Gabe Rotter has just published his second book, The Human Bobby, and we're geeking out because a big hotel makes an appearance.

Since writing about books about hotels is one of our things, we decided to ask Gabe a few questions about his book and his own hotel habits. And awaaay we go!

Your book has a long section that takes place at Shutters on The Beach in Santa Monica. Why did you choose this particular hotel for the setting?
The Human Bobby is about a wealthy man's fall from affluence to homelessness, and after he loses his house, I wanted him to spend a great deal of time in a hotel room, squandering away the rest of his money in the most luxurious and extravagant place possible. Shutters, to me, is the nicest (and most expensive) hotel in Santa Monica, where the story takes place, and it seemed like the ideal place for him to fritter away the rest of his money in (relative, considering his situation) comfort.

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Hotel Nightclubs / Viva Vegas / XS / Gabe Rotter / → All Tags

A Night of XS At Encore Las Vegas

Where: 3131 Las Vegas Blvd S [map], Las Vegas, NV, United States, 89109

Hey, HotelChatter party people: we've got a special surprise for you on this dreary March Tuesday. Our VIP Hotel Reviewer Gabe Rotter has returned to give us a review of the newest nightclub in Sin City. Experience a night of XS through Gabe's eyes.

In Vegas for one night last weekend, the night after Valentine's day, we decided to stay at the brand spankin' new building at the Wynn Las Vegas called Encore. [Ed Note: perhaps you're familiar, faithful readers?] It was a three-day holiday weekend and rates were high on Saturday so we decided to give Sunday a shot.

The rates on the web were in the $2-400 range, so for shits-n-giggles we decided to give them a call. That was a good call -- pun intended. They were running a special: rooms at the Wynn for a RIDIC $129 and at the Encore for an equally-ridic-especially-for-a-brand-new-hotel-room-in-which-it-is-entirely-possible-that-no-one-has-even-pooped-in-the-toilet-yet $149. We decided to go for the Encore, at the reservation agent's urging.

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VIP Hotel Reviews / VIP Hotel Reviewer Series / Gabe Rotter / Pet-Friendly Hotels / Rosewood Resorts / → All Tags

Author's Dog-Friendly Hotel Pick in Oprah's Backyard

Where: 900 San Ysidro Lane [map], Montecito, CA, United States, 93108

We now present you with our VIP Hotel Reviewer Series in which we hand-pick experts in the travel and media worlds and beyond to tell us what are their favorite hotels and why. Once a week, we'll feature a hotel review from said VIPs about their favorite leisure or business hotels. Pay attention: These VIPs are experts at what they do and they don't mess around when it comes to their hotels.

The next VIP in the series is Gabe Rotter, author of the Simon & Schuster novel Duck Duck Wally about a chubby whiteboy who is the secret ghostwriter for a famous gangsta rapper, Oral B. Since Wally's beloved bulldog Dr. Barry Schwartzman is an important character in the book (he gets dog-napped!) we figured Gabe could tell us a safe place to travel with your dogs. Enjoy.

[Photo: IanL]

My favorite dog-friendly hotel is a place I'll likely never be able to afford again. I went there once, a few years ago, for two nights. And I'll be working it off until the day I die, old and hunched and grey and wrinkly, drooling into my Jello and dreaming about my two, wonderful nights with my bitch at the San Ysidro Ranch in Santa Barbara.

Oh, and my dog came too.

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