ADAM L. G. NEVILL was born in Birmingham, England, in 1969 and grew up in England and New Zealand. He is an author of horror fiction. Of his novels, The Ritual, Last Days, No One Gets Out Alive and The Reddening were all winners of The August Derleth Award for Best Horror Novel. He has also published three collections of short stories, with Some Will Not Sleep winning the British Fantasy Award for Best Collection, 2017.
Imaginarium adapted The Ritual and No One Gets Out Alive into feature films and more of his work is currently in development for the screen.
Creepy Book Alert! One of my picks for you as a total winner with Halloween on way.
Adam Nevill is the King of Horror as far as I am concerned. I read a lot of horror and dark books, he is the only author that can actually make me feel fear, struggle with being disturbed and require me to sometimes put the book down and cuddle my cats for comfort!
Apartment 16 is in a big old building in a posh part of London. Many of the residents are elderly, they've been there for a very long time. The descriptions and atmospheric writing had me right IN this dark, musty, creepy and strange building. I sensed the evil before I found it in the pages.
Adam’s writing takes you into the worlds he creates. It’s like I can smell the evil, touch it, sense it and fear it. Not many writers can do that to me. His novels do.
A pretty young woman arrives from America, she's here to deal with her Aunt's Apartment who has passed away leaving this place to her mother and her. She has no idea that she's stepping in through the gates of hell.
Nevill builds this one up slowly, you've got to pay attention and savour the pages which are crucial to the overall plot and are simply stunning in regards to the writing. I'm stunned at low reviews of this book, my suspicion is many didn't get the build up and were expecting shock factors from early pages. Whatever is was I disagree strongly.
At the point where I read the first of many disturbing scene I gasped, stopped and had to read the paragraph over and over again. Glee! Oh I knew that it was gong to be so good!
The plot is unique, never read anything like it. The imagery is so disturbing it made my skin crawl. From big moments to tiny detail the book is a work of immense value. Where Adam gets his imagination from is beyond me, his ability to pull you into the book like a black hole - I feared I may never get out again.
Madness, obsession, fear, evil - it's all here. I get a bit speechless doing reviews of Adam's books. I freaking love each and every one! The book gets darker and darker and my fascination with it deeper and deeper. There is nothing light and fluffy in an Adam Nevill book. From subtle yet shocking moments to in-your-face horrific scenes it's got everything you need to be entertained, somewhat sickened and disturbed.
I devoured and hung off every word, not wanting to waste any of it. I was absolutely astonished with where the plot went and the last quarter of the book is gripping and terrifying. Nevill is a wordsmith and I'm pretty sure magic is weaved in his books, entranced and lost in a world of horror beyond imagination. You'll be left with visual images seared on your brain - trust me.
So what is Apartment 16? You don't want to know. You don't want to open that door. But go on! I did, then there was no turning back. Genius, brilliant, delectably dark. 5 huge stars from me. An unforgettable read. Go there if you dare.
I'll never shop at Sainsbury's again after reading this book (English supermarket for overseas readers). Adam Nevill - you made the hairs on my arms stand up again and scared the crap out of me in the middle of the night.
I read the paperback version of this book which resides on my very own shelf dedicated to his books. Still Adam’s No. 1 fan.
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I have finally surrendered to the fact that I just cannot and will not read any more of Apartment 16. I was under the impression that the aim of a horror novel was to scare not bore and was disappointed to find that I could not get into it at all which resulted in me skimming then skipping entire chapters revolving Seth because I found them unneccesary and repulsive. The wording was superfluous especially when trying to create atmosphere, which was wholly unsuccessful anyway. Only one instance gave me a chill and that was because I'd experienced something similar, so Apryl and the inheritance aspect seemed sufficient but would have faired better as the sole story. Overall I managed half the book but its not one I can see myself attempting to finish... and has given me second thoughts on the rubbish that I considered to be The Birthing House
Another reviewer described this book as H. P. Lovecraft's story "Pickman's Model" expanded to novel length, which I think is an apt description. In the hands of a less skilled writer, the attempt would have fallen down flat. Adam Nevill has managed the task admirably. "Apartment 16" is a nod to HPL and Ramsey Campbell, only better written than anything by these two gents (IMO). More than a touch of Clive Barker too.
Nevill's writing is rich and elegant, the sentences beautifully crafted, the images he conjures vivid and terrifying. Very few writers can describe the terrible and the grotesque on page after page without it getting banal and repetitive, and he is definitely one of them. Best of all, the plot and pacing do not get drowned out by the beautiful prose. Having read "Apartment 16", I will definitely be on the lookout for his other books. Hell, I'd probably even read a tractor operating manual if this guy wrote it, his style is that good.
The only (minor) flaw in the story was the main character, who was nosy and annoying (a somewhat stereotypical portrait of a young-ish American from a British point of view). I think that even the spelling of her name (Apryl, which I see grated on many a reader's nerves) was changed for the sole purpose of making her more irritating.
The ideas in this are very interesting and I particularly liked the angle of an artist obsessed with the grotesque breaking down barriers between worlds and infecting others by association. However, I didn't like this book. Describing the horrific apparitions and artworks in detail over and over again gets boring and really it might've been better to leave them more to the imagination. I preferred Apryl's chapters on the whole since they were atmospherically creepy and dealt with discovering what was going on, whereas Seth's chapters tended to focus more on shocking and disgusting things (like that whole chapter in the supermarket) - though his breakdown was very artfully described. Apryl's chapters kept me reading, if it had been all Seth I doubt whether I would have bothered to finish the book.
‘Apartment 16’ is a chillingly effective horror novel about weird goings on centring on a London apartment building. Apryl, a young American woman has come to London to sort out the affairs of her great aunt, a resident of the building who has died. Meanwhile, Seth is a young man with a troubled past who works as a security guard there. The interweaving narrative sees the two investigate the increasingly strange events at the block and delve into its dark history. Like all the Adam Nevill books I’ve read, there’s a deep creepiness here. He is particularly good at describing the unusual, giving you just enough to get your mind working overtime to fill in the details. The book is maybe a tad longer than it needed to be, but that’s a small criticism of an otherwise excellent horror story. It’s tense, compelling and darkly enjoyable.
An awful, truly awful book with almost no redeeming features whatsoever. Poorly written, with very poor english in places that was just laughable in some places.
The story concerns the haunting of a residential building in London, and centers on the stories of a night watchman and a young American girl who inherits an apartment from an estranged aunt and is staying there while the estate is settled. It starts out reasonably well, but descends rapidly into nonsense. The building is haunted by a nazi painter, who apparently chummed about with 'the great beast' Crowley and learned how to open a dimensional portal to hell in his living room so that he could paint what he saw through there. Needless to say it didn't end well for him. The residents of the building got rid of him and his artwork and now his ghost is taking his revenge on them.
This could be a reasonable premise for a book if it wasn't executed quite so poorly. The worst parts were those describing the 'hellish visions' that contained so much silly english it was difficult to take seriously at all (my favourite was 'limbs dangled with alarming frequency' - were they waving?). The further the book progressed the more overcooked the prose became. Half this book is overly grim descriptions of London and its inhabitants as sort of bestial creatures, even the ordinary people are all repulsive in some way and the author takes great pains to describe this in minute detail. It's very tiring, and the characters are so shallow and two-dimensional that I found I didn't give a damn about any of them. I got to the end of this book through sheer bloody-mindedness. I would not recommend it at all.
El apartamento 16 es una historia de terror ambientada en un edificio de lujo en Londres el Barrington House. Por un lado tenemos a Apryl que ha heredado la casa de su tía abuela, y llega al edificio para limpiar la casa y poder venderla. Apryl queda cautivada por las cosas de su tía abuela, su increíble vestuario de los años 40, encuentra unos diarios y quiere saber más. En esos diarios narrados a modo de locura, su tía habla de una extraña enfermedad y cosas siniestras qué ve. Por su parte Apryl también empieza a ver cosas. La parte de Apryl me ha gustado. Por otro lado tenemos a Seth, que estúdio bellas artes y ahora es conserje de noche en el edificio, esté entrá en contacto con la entidad macabra qué habita en el apartamento 16, comienza a ver a un niño con capucha. Seth sufre un descenso a la locura, dibuja freneticamente, se abandona físicamente y sucumbe a las peticiones del niño, llegando a atacar a vecinos del bloque. La parte de Seth a veces se me hacía pesada y repetitiva.
Si te gustan las historias de misterios ambientadas en edificios te recomiendo: 1. El apartamento olvidado de SL Grey (terror) 2. Un apartamento en en París de Lucy Foley (thriller) 3. Cierra todas las puertas de Riley Sager (thriller)
For starters I'm never living in any house or apartment that is numbered 16, im not going to become a night porter and if I'm ever left an apartment in Knightsbridge I'll be going there only in the day and won't stick around for long.
It's creepy from the start and slowly builds to weird and slightly more creepy before culminating in really bloody weird and creepy as fuck!
Apryl's perspective is the mystery part of this book, she's uncovering her great-aunt Lillian's past and figuring out how she died, the creepy factor ratchets up when Apryl finds Lillian's journals and then crazy starts.
Seth's perspective is him going batshit crazy and wondering why, as I'm sure most of us would be doing.
The descriptions in this book are wonderful, from the apartments to the violence, gore and horror, just wonderful.
I believe this is my 4th Adam Nevill book and I am finding I enjoy them more and more but wtf is it with the hooves man!?
2020 has been the year of discovering Adam Nevill. So far, I’ve read Last Days, The Ritual, The Reddening, Wyrd & Other Derelictions and his two mini-collections Before You Wake and Before You Sleep and all have been fantastic reads. While falling in love with Last Days, I made sure to pick up his back catalog so that everything was locked and loaded on my Kindle so I could dive in ASAP. Of course, ASAP meant it took me a few more months longer to get to Apartment 16 than originally planned, and, this being a pleasure read for me, I took a little longer to let this soak in.
So, knowing that I had all of the previous Nevill books at my disposal, why this one? Why Apartment 16?
Near the end of last year, a friend of mine read this book and messaged me to say that this had been the most frightening book they’d ever read. It made me curious. So, that was the decision maker. If it scared my friend, it would surely make me keep my feet tucked in at night, yeah?
What I liked: One thing I’ve quickly discovered is that it’s almost impossible to accurately review a Nevill book because there are so many layers, so many textures added to with each passing chapter that when the books really take off, once the base layers have been poured and the foundation has settled, you can’t speak of them in the review as it’ll be 100% spoilers.
Apartment 16 starts off with the familiar ‘haunted house’ narrative of a rich aunt has passed away, leaving her apartment in a prestigious part of London to her sister and niece who live in America. They’ve not seen each other in many, many years and had though the aunt had died long before. The niece travels to London to review the apartment and get it set up to sell, but once there finds out her aunt was eccentric and the apartment itself features a number of oddities.
It’s from that synopsis that Nevill showcases why he is a master storytelling and, while I’m no scholar on older works, harkens back to the time when story and setting where told over a number of pages, not blasted at us in thirty second sound bites. Nevill really took his time to create a number of working pieces that when they all came together left me stunned and breathless. Even the two characters I hated and wished were not in the book for a solid 90% of the story were paramount to the story and at the ending were necessary for how things occurred.
Nevill really does have a way of crafting a story and as I mentioned, layers the narrative with in-depth and intriguing plot points. Much like how things happened with Last Days, Apartment 16 has some fantastic ‘additional’ back story which really elevated our antagonist. Loved the eccentric meeting with fans of this character as well as how those who’d previously known this character had ‘evolved.’ Again, really tough to describe these workings while staying spoiler free!
What I didn’t like: I mentioned it briefly, but there were two characters I loathed. I’ll briefly say that the young boy was necessary, but I found his arrivals at the beginning distractive and I wasn’t sure of the need (until later on) and Miles. For someone who stated they wanted to learn so much more about our antagonist he sure seemed to be a bit wishy-washy on learning more later on.
Why you should buy this: If we go all the way back to my initial introduction where my friend told me how scary it was, the logical question now would be; did this book scare me? Answer. Absolutely! Again, much like Last Days, Nevill has a way of shaping the shadows in the corner of the room so that they move and slither while you read. The apartment itself is sneakily left with limited descriptions so when we do spend time in there, it creaks and groans and makes you wish a light was on or that you were reading the book in a crowded space. Safety in numbers is best while enjoying a Nevill book. Apartment 16 may be ten years old now, but there is nothing about it that feels dated. It’s a modern classic that gives us a new spin on how haunted places can act and the lengths the space will go to get what it needs.
I absolutely loved this one and think you will as well.
Tenía muchísimas ganas de leer a este autor y la verdad me ha sorprendido, para bien, para muy bien concretamente.
Narrada a dos voces principalmente, Adam nos irá desgranando la historia que confluye en ese apartamento 16 situado en Barrington House. Por un lado tenemos a Apryl, ha heredado el apartamento de su tía abuela y al llegar se queda no sólo sorprendida sino también aterrada por lo que Lillian ha vivido en ese apartamento. Se da cuenta del tipo de vida que tenía y la culpabilidad hace mella en ella al ver y darse cuenta de lo sola que estaba.
Conoceremos a Seth, el portero vigilante del turno de noche de los apartamentos de lujo. Tiene una vida triste, vive en una habitación sin más motivación que intentar sobrevivir y estar al servicio de los habitantes de Barrington House.
Y como nexo común tenemos a ese misterioso apartamento 16 que trae por la calle de la amargura a todos los vecinos. Poco a poco, las vivencias de Apryl y de Seth irán confluyendo para descubrir la verdadera historia de este bloque de pisos de lujo. Afectará de distinta manera a ambos pero ambos se verán abocados a una espiral de locura y terror que tiene su foco en el número 16 de Barrington House.
La historia me ha mantenido pegada a las hojas, sin darme un respiro y con pasajes realmente desagradables. El final es lo que no me ha terminado de convencer, no lo termino de ver acorde con la historia y queda algún cabo suelto, aún así es muy entretenido y adictivo.
Atmospheric, unsettling, and well-developed, this psychological horror novel had plenty going for it from the first pages. However, its extremely slow pace coupled with a rushed ending made the overall experience of the story fall flat. Oh, and the excessive use of adjectives was frustrating as well. Mr. Nevill is obviously quite talented; I’d venture into another of his novels anytime. This one was just okay, though.
Where to start with this book without giving anything away - Ok I will admit that the scary apartment/house/cabin seems to have been done to death (and no pun intended) but with recent films and a slew of books along a similar vein you do get the feeling that the subject has been played out - after all there are only so many ways you can see it going (the classic there is something down there so why do the young pretty people still go in to the cellar). However this book is still a great read. Ok the author has written it in an open and easy format which means that once you start reading you do not feel the pages fly past- the characters you can associate and even feel for even when in the next chapter they are presented in less than favourable light. And then there is the horror element of it - as with all of these books there has to be a someone or something that is the source of all the terrible events - however unlike an 80s monster horror movie when regardless of the build up the final monster reveal is always a disappointment - this story holds it all together and still I feel presents something to fear and shy away from. So for me - a great first book and one I would love to see turned in to a film (and thats a rare call even from me) - lets see what Adam Nevill pulls off next as I will certainly be looking for his next book
I absolutely loved this, easily the best book I have read this year. Just like The Ritual, this one is going to play on my mind for a good while....
Adam Nevill’s horror really strikes a cord with me and chills me to the bone. Its something about the infinite 'unseen' that waits for us all. This story was particularly good at capturing the full enormity of the eternal terror, confusion and bewilderment in store for each of the characters. Like The Ritual, it was the inevitability that it would 'get them in the end' that kept me hooked and dreading turning the page in some parts.
I actually feel like I have undergone a trauma reading this (why do I do this to myself?!). On to the next one!!
Cuando he terminado esta ¿novela? me he quedado básicamente transpuesto porque no me he enterado de nada, y lo he intentado, dios sabe que lo he hecho. Después he pensado que el día que decida suicidarme seguramente me encontraran en el aseo de mi casa con una recortada en la derecha y en la izquierda esta píldora de veneno abierta por cualquier de sus páginas. Lamentable, este puchero de mal gusto pasa a formar parte a partir de hoy de las tres cosas que nunca podrás olvidar en tu vida, a saber: un mal polvo, un mal amigo, y la lectura de “el apartamento 16”. Me cago en mi vida es que cada página que me leía me daba más ganas de estrangular a alguien !qué despropósito¡,!qué manera de malgastar el dinero para quien haya tenido el valor de de ir a una librería a comprarlo, que os lo juro por dios que los venden allí, en nuestro lugar más sagrado, entre los demás libros, mejor coger un billete de 20 euros y pegarle fuego, así consigues ahorrarte la diarrea mental a la que te somete este tipo con lo que va escribiendo. Pero como a todo en esta vida hay que verle el lado positivo, yo lo he encontrado, ya tengo el regalo perfecto para el bueno mi cuñado, solo tengo que envolverlo con papel satinado y dejarlo debajo del árbol el día de papá Noel, que se joda. Si lo he calificado con una estrella y media es solo por dos razones: La primera es que me lo he pasado genial en el grupo de lectura, son personas increíbles que aman lo que yo amo, todos tienen ese buen gusto. La segunda es que después del debate he podido comprobar que ninguno de ellos ha perdido más neuronas de las que uno se puede desprender después de haber leído semejante bodrio. Un consejo, no lo leas, otro consejo, no lo compres, uno más, mantenlo alejado de todas las personas a las que quieres y si puedes consúltalo con un farmacéutico
The back cover made this book sound exciting and something a little different to what I've been reading lately. But it didn't really meet my expectations. It was a bit yucky at times, and I didn't like the characters. The female character of Apryl starts off as a girl who likes feminine things and is sad about the death of an aunt she didn't know and by the end of the book she is suddenly a confident woman who takes a crazy risk of entering a haunted apartment with a man she doesn't know who looks and smells like death warmed up!! By the end of the book - which I couldn't wait to get out of the way before I had even read half of it - we still have no idea how the evil presence got there, where it was for the 50 years it was dormant, or what happened to it afterwards. And we also have no idea what happened to any of the characters either. So it seemed unfinished to me unless there will be a sequel? Disappointing, but maybe my expectations were too high.
Muy lento el desarrollo, no encontré nada que cause miedo, al inicio todo se basaba en hechos ya sucedidos, para mi gusto quedaron demasiados hilos sueltos.
Some doors are better left closed...In Barrington House, an upmarket block in London, there is an empty apartment. No one goes in, no one comes out. And it's been that way for fifty years. Until the night watchman hears a disturbance after midnight and investigates. What he experiences is enough to change his life forever. A young American woman, Apryl, arrives at Barrington House. She's been left an apartment by her mysterious Great Aunt Lillian who died in strange circumstances. Rumours claim Lillian was mad. But her diary suggests she was implicated in a horrific and inexplicable event decades ago. Determined to learn something of this eccentric woman, Apryl begins to unravel the hidden story of Barrington House. She discovers that a transforming, evil force still inhabits the building. And the doorway to Apartment 16 is a gateway to something altogether more terrifying...
I must confess that I don't often read horror - not because I don't like it, but because I am a complete coward and end up sleeping with the lights on after a late night session with anything by King! Apartment 16 is the first outright horror book I've read in a long while, and I found myself disappointed.
The prose is very clean, and the structure of the story lends itself to quick reading - especially as we switch viewpoints between Seth, a man whose life is going downhill at a rapid rate of knots, and Apryl, an American girl trying to work out exactly what has happened to her great-aunt.
The first half of the book was dark and atmospheric, with the 'monster' (as it were) off-screen and represented by noises and fleeting visions of twisted characters out of the corner of the eye. This part was well-written and built up to a point where I was both excited and scared about what would come.
However, the final pay off left me feeling very letdown. It felt as though it trailed off rather than ending with an explosive finale. There didn't seem to be any true resolution, and certainly none of the characters achieved the redemption I thought they would finally achieve. As soon as the backstory concerning Hessen was introduced, the novel became much more dry and there were many occasions where the dialogue between two characters seemed there only to discuss issues that the author needed front and centre.
Although Seth and Apryl were interesting characters (but what the HELL is going on with that name? What on earth is wrong with April?!), the secondary characters didn't seem to add anything to the overall tale. In fact, the whole section dealing with the Friends of Hessen felt completely erroneous.
Also, I have to confess that I procrastinated my way through this book. It just didn't grip me at all - I found myself watching football matches, writing on Twitter, reading other blogs every time I sat down with the intention of completing it. I didn't feel the compulsive need to keep reading it that I thought I would.
Lastly, I must just mention the language. I am not averse to some swearing, especially when used well, but the constant repetition of a certain swear word had me cringing. It came across like a kid in a schoolyard trying to sound adult, rather than as an essential part of the story.
Altogether, I found it dull and unappealing - in fact, I shall damn it and say that, as a horror novel, it doesn't leave me needing to sleep with the lights on.
ok, so just got through reading this book, which i managed to read in a day. it was that type of book that i couldn't put down until i had finished it. the only thing that disappointed me was the ending, it just felt a little rushed. i am sure there are people that will disagree with that statement, and it was well written and enthralling enough to the point where i didn't want to stop reading until i had reached the end, but i cant help feel the slightest bit let down with how it ended. i'm sure there are people who have read it thinking "well, how else did you expect it to end?!" and your right to a certain extent, i just feel a lack of real closure to a story i feel was well rounded and well told. ive heard of people saying the grotesque horrific descriptions were too extreme, i am wondering what you expected from a horror novel?! yes, there are a couple of passages that create some uneasy imagery but i wouldn't say that rules it out from being enjoyed by a wide audience, it is after all in the horror genre, and there has been plenty worse depicted in many other books/films. this is probably the first book i have ever read however that created a real sense of fear whilst reading!! i would recommend anyone who is a fan of horror to read this book, and it certainly proves Adam Nevill has a true talent.
Yes!!! I was very happy to give this book a four rating. I thought his first book was a little slow but had some flashes of brilliance and I was cautiously optimistic about his second book: I was not disappointed! This seems to be somewhat of a popular opinion, at least two other GR friends have made similar comments.
The short version: a young woman travels to London to take possession (ha!) of her late aunts posh apartment in an upscale apartment building that spans two city blocks. There she uncovers a mystery about a mad artist and paintings and mirrors that are portals to......things.
Really liked this one and especially enjoyed a delightfully horrifying character in the form of a pint sized English hoodlum.
I am on to book three from Neville and would recommend this to horror fans.
"El comienzo prometía, pero todo se vino abajo rápidamente y lo que parecía que iba a ser la historia de terror del año, acabó convirtiéndose para mí en una de las mayores decepciones que he tenido".
El libro inicia bien, la historia es interesante y tiene un buen setting y lo de ir intercalando los capítulos de Seth y Apryl al inicio queda muy bien.
Y cuando encuentra el diario de la tia-abuela se pone interesante, y lo del pintor Felix Hessen agrega mucho a la atmosfera.
Pero creo que se alarga mucho, mete cosas que ni al caso como lo de el no-romance con Miles, o lo de Seth siendo golpeado.
Y SPOILERS,
S P O I L E R S
pero hacia el final SPOILERS y la parte final tan anticlimática, y lo del epilogo innecesario.
2.5 stars
Popsugar 2025 - 15 A book that an AI chatbot recommends based on your favorite book
"Set je pokušao da se odupre, izvijajući se i odgurujući od teškog gustog vazduha koji ga je pritiskao s leđa, preteći da ga obori napred. Instiktivno je znao - pređe li prag te sobe, dogodiće se nešto užasno. Moraće da se suoči sa nečim od čega će mu srce istog trena stati."
Uhhhh... preživeo sam boravak u stanu br 16 u prestižnom ali ozloglašenom Berington hausu, sumornom i depresivnom Londonu viđenom kroz oči antijunaka ovog romana - Seta. Kada uporedim Kult i Stan br 16, uočavaju se stilske sličnosti, posebno u Nevilovoj veštini da konstantno održava sablasnu atmosferu, bez jeftinih jump and scare momenata. Iako statičniji od Kulta, Stan br 16 ide korak dalje kada je u pitanju način zastrašivanja čitaoca. Kroz groteksne kreature na Setovim i Hesenovim slikama čiji se sadržaji graniče sa morbidnošću, ali opet (bar meni) ne prelaze granice nepodnošljivog (iako umeju da budu vrlo mučne... ali baš mučne) izuzetno efektno uliva strah u kosti. Živopisno opisani prizori zla, patnje i bola izazivaju neprijatnu nelagodu. Likovi su dobro razrađeni, dopadljiviji od likova u Kultu. Ejpril, buntovna i mlada Amerikanka, koja se upušta u istraživanje sumnjive smrti svoje baba tetke, i Set, umetnik bez ambicija koji biva uvučen u kovitlac paranormalnih dešavanja koji mu vraćaju inspiraciju za slikanje umetničkih dela kojima želi da napravi revoluciju u umetničkom svetu, ne znajući da će ga to i duhovno i moralno uništiti. Zanimljiv je i prikaz bogatih stanovnika Berington hausa koji, prokleti zbog zločina počinjenim u stanu br 16, žive tragičnim i ispraznim životima ispunjenim bedom i očajem. Neću puno dužiti, Stan br 16 je ispunio moja očekivanja kada je u pitanju horor žanr. 5🌟 i moja najtoplija preporuka ako želite dobar horor, mračan i mučan, koji će vam adrenalin konstantno držati na visokom nivou. A ja ću se kad tad ponovo vratiti Kultu
An over-written over-wrought abysmally edited and written book. It purports to be horror and has one of the most brilliant covers of a horror novel I've seen in years - must commend the cover designer and the marketing department. But the author is either a really bad writer (with an even worse editor) or he simply cannot write to save his life. His sentences are repetitive, over-written, and most of all, just plain boring to read. How did this book ever get published? With so many excellent horror novels being published and great new writers coming into the genre every passing year, it's a travesty to see trash like this on an otherwise respectable publisher's list. If you can read this and find it lives up to one-tenth of the hype, you deserve a Bram Stoker Award!
Este libro trata de un misterioso apartamento donde si entras no sales o sales como un cencerro. Lo hemos leído en una lectura en grupo donde nos las prometiamos muy ansiosos por meterle mano.
Es tan jodío el apartamento que muchos no lo han conseguido acabar porque se han quedado dentro, no sabemos nada de ellos. ¿Qué les habrá pasado? Yo que vosotros pasaría de largo, no están los tiempos para quedarse encerrado dentro de un apartamento.
Pues la verdad es que no me ha gustado nada de nada. Me ha resultado pesado, enrevesado, confuso y aburrido. No me ha provocado miedo en ningún momento, solo repulsión en algunos casos, y la mayoría del tiempo ni eso.
Tenemos dos personajes principales: por un lado Apryl, una joven americana que acaba de heredar un apartamento en una buena zona de Londres tras la muerte de una tía abuela a la que no llegó a conocer, y por otro lado, Seth, el portero del turno de noche del edificio. Acompañamos a Seth en su progresivo descenso a los abismos, un descenso confuso y sobre todo largo y aburrido, mientras por otro lado Apryl investiga la vida y los últimos años de su tía abuela, su misteriosa muerte y los oscuros secretos que alberga el edificio donde vivió.
El relato se hace horriblemente pesado, repetitivo, llega un momento que empiezas a leer en diagonal a ver cómo avanza la cosa, por si mejora, pero todo desemboca en un final descafeinado e insulso. Desde luego, no puedo recomendar este libro, lo siento.
“Apartment 16” was my first introduction to the horror writing of Adam Nevill, and I discovered a complex, literate, terrifying world-view. Barrington House in England is a high-class, although aging, apartment block. Most of the apartments have been owned for decades, and only very rarely does one become available at the death of the previous owner, or due to inheritance. Such is the case when Lillian passes mysteriously and her great-niece Apryl, an American, inherits. At the behest of her mother, Apryl travels to London to examine the apartment, ready it for sale, and to sell the furnishings. What Apryl discovers is a multitude of horrifying secrets; umpteen layers of secrets, kept not only by Lillian and her late husband, but by other apartment-owners, and by the staff. Apryl will find out WHY Apartment 16 has been empty for decades—and why its nature has been kept secret from anyone outside the Barrington House.
Author Adam Nevill has an incredible imagination, and a flair for horror that creeps up on little cat feet—and then scares the blazes out of the reader. I can’t forget any of his novels, and plan to reread all.