A Gentleman in Moscow is one of those rare books that are just fun to read. The stakes are high yet the moments are light with joy. The characters, while few, and the ensemble, while small, all play a key role in the general enjoyment of the story.
The story moves when it needs to move but not at a pace that puts the plot before the character. The characters evolve and grow in ways that have you rooting for their success but also in ways that have you very aware of their fallibilities and humanity. This is a book that really rewards both the close reader and the uninvolved reader. This is a book that delivers on its promise yet doesn't promise anything.
The book is, at its core, ridiculous, absurd even. The stakes are, conceptually, as ridiculous and absurd. Dissident, whose one patriotic poem has allowed him to be spared from the firing wall, is staying in a five-star hotel as it declines into the Soviet era. That is absurd. Yet at no point is your belief suspended to the point that you're not enjoying the book, because sometimes the greatest ways to have fun are when we stop taking ourselves so seriously. That's what this book does.
It doesn't take itself seriously. It doesn't take the characters seriously but at the same time it doesn't take liberties with the times or the atmosphere. Essentially he's walking a tightrope between seriousness and levity and he does a really good job.