Hair sodden with sweat, she doubles over and pants for air until she catches sight of the figure beside the bed, silhouetted by faint ambient light. A form dressed in a pale gown, the small head tatty. Jess screams." Across the road, those who watch the vicarage’s transformation see windows beaming golden. Not only has the grin at ground level broadened, but the eyes are open and alight upstairs. A watcher may remark that after sleeping for so long, the building appears to have been roused from within.” locusmag (20 February 2020). "2019 in Review: From Haunted Landscape to Hollywood Costume by John Langan". Locus Online . Retrieved 28 July 2020. After an absurdly long fallow period, literary horror is showing signs of a return to commercial success and cultural visibility. a b locusmag (18 January 2018). "2017 Stoker Awards Preliminary Ballot". Locus Online . Retrieved 2 January 2019.

I’ve read much of his work now, and Adam Nevill’s writing never disappoints. It always manages to be horrific, and in the same breath thoughtful. It’s a rare breed who can frighten but also offer keen insight into the human condition. In need of money, Jess is determined to find a better life for herself, away from her abusive former husband, and for her daughter, Izzy, to get her away from bullies at school. As such, Jess accepts a position as a care giver to “a shrunken figure within a wheelchair, Mrs. Florence Gardner.” The frail eighty-nine-year-old invalid suffers from dementia and lives in a huge, rambling manse, Nerthus House, “a dark warren that hasn’t been cleared, let alone tidied. In years.” Flo, in spite of “her rheumy eyes,” can be incredibly fast as Jess learns when she gets too close to the old woman, angering her, and Jess gets slapped and spat upon. Behind Flo’s “emaciated figure,” haggard appearance, and dully staring eyes, however, lies much, much more than appears—something both Jess and Izzy begin to discover much to their dismay. Jess gets a solid job, as relief care aide for Flo, an older woman with dementia who spends her days in her wheelchair in her sprawling home. Nevill does a great job of setting up the chessboard before he begins to move the pieces towards the ultimate moments. Throughout, I was rapt, knowing at any moment ‘it’ was going to happen, that we would come upon the incident that threw open the doors and exposed the truths and when it does, the reader will not be disappointed.Flo’s vast home, Nerthus House, may resemble a stately vicarage in an idyllic village, but the labyrinthine interior is a dark, cluttered warren filled with pagan artefacts. Secondly, Adam Nevill has always struggled with endings. His best-known novel The Ritual won a Derleth Award for Best Novel and was adapted into a moderately-successful horror film but while the story of a load of old friends getting lost on a hiking holiday absolutely explodes out of the gate with loads of atmosphere, characterisation and some really memorable set-pieces, it changes both tone and subject matter about two thirds of the way through. This problem recurs in No One Gets Out Alive, a novel about an impoverished middle-class girl living in a haunted house in a shitty part of Birmingham that suddenly becomes a novel about a wealthy author dealing with a haunting in her palatial country mansion. It’s not that the stories are poorly-written on a sentence-by-sentence level or that Nevill runs out of ideas… it’s just that he has a weird tendency to produce stories that collapse at the end of the second act, forcing him to graft a more-or-less unrelated short story onto the spine of the novel in an effort to pad his manuscripts out to the kinds of lengths expected of conventional novels. Don’t worry, I won’t spoil anything for you but the ending at least for me was too predictable and again, just not scary enough. It wraps up entirely in the end but it just didn’t leave me horrified or blown away.

House Of Small Shadows author Adam Nevill: Erotica paved the way to horror". Metro . Retrieved 31 August 2014. The story climaxes with a confrontation at Flo's house between Tony and Jess. So odd and yet so true that so many idiots believe that yeah I failed on this planet but I will kill us all so we can all start over in Heaven. Like do you think you will be rewarded in heaven when you have done such a thing. It is during this escalation that we see Flo and her coven really excel and it is just so damn good! A very different and surprising ending that I really enjoyed.VanderMeer, Jeff. "House of Small Shadows by Adam Nevill – review". The Guardian . Retrieved 31 August 2014. The Nerthus House job pays more than most gigs in the caregiving world, and Jess’s boss wastes no time in reminding her that her service to the aged Flo must be impeccable. This is her shot to change her life, escape her ex-husband, secure her daughter’s wellbeing, and the reader feels the daunting weight of how much this means to the character. It’s nearly Halloween so it seems appropriate that this week’s review visits the darker side of human nature, and the horror that comes with it. An eerie folk horror novel from the author of Cunning Folk , The Reddening , The Ritual , No One Gets Out Alive and the four-time winner of the August Derleth Award for Best Horror Novel.

There will be intrigue instilled within the reader with various mysterious elements of which at the centre resides an elderly women named Flo of 89 years of age, one who had once two children and a husband and now alone, a victim of a stroke three years previous and a dementia sufferer, mysterious happenings to be revealed and discovered amidst the presence of her carer Jess one who is determined to investigate and uncover Flo’s past. I didn't find this as enjoyable as his other work but that is mostly because of it being plot focused and without being in the characters' heads (see the notes at the end of the book) but overall it was still a captivating read and still with trademark moments of Nevill's beautiful poetic writing. Based in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, Steve has released over a dozen novels and novellas as well as a number of collections. He has appeared alongside some of horror’s biggest names within some truly excellent anthologies. British Fantasy Awards 2014: the nominees". British Fantasy Society. Archived from the original on 6 May 2019 . Retrieved 31 August 2014.

The first act is dominated by Jess trying to balance the demands of her job as a carer with the demands of her position as a mother as well as the myriad complications thrown into the mix by the presence of the ex-husband, the daughter’s problems at school, and the challenges of working as a carer when the company that employs you refuses to give you adequate support. This aspect of the book is also really well-grounded as Jess’ appeals to her co-worker are met with resentful scorn while any appeals to the boss are met with threats and high-handed finger-wagging about how she should be jolly grateful to have a job in the first place. About fifteen years ago, Adam Nevill (a.k.a. Adam L.G. Nevill) was the next big thing in literary horror. It turns out that fifteen years is a long time. Author and career longevity comes from the ability to keep their work fresh by doing something new and Nevill should be applauded for continuing to push the envelope. He did this with his short story collection (complete without characters) Wyrd and Other Derelictions and continues to do so with The Vessel. Were you to list all-time great horror authors from Stephen King, Ramsey Campbell, Robert McCammon to James Herbert, all have written books which are seen as lesser than their most famous works and this is how The Vessel might well be seen. Even if it is far from his best, it remains a fascinating side story, which perhaps has more in common with his shorter fiction than his more famous novels. As Halloween approaches I have several books on witches that are on my shelves. I never seem to get to them and I do love witch stories. I can really buy into them as there is about a 100 years or so of history with documented trial history and the like. This kind of stuff really happened and there is proof at least from a demented trial system that tried these witches. I can't believe it took me this long to write this review, because I read this ages ago when it first came out. To be honest, I thought I had already reviewed it. Anyway, I've read all of Adam's work, and 99% of it I have really loved. He really knows how to craft a tale that keeps you hooked till the end, and this one is no different.

So first off, let me just say this book was too short for it to be as horrifying as it was. But man, was it scary! The characters were incredibly well fleshed out for such a short book. I liked all of the characters, but I was particularly taken with Flo. She was a very entertaining individual. I swear I could literally picture her in front of me, with facial expressions, gestures, and attitude-filled body language as she speaks. Again, kudos on a job well done in fleshing out all of the characters and bringing them to life!You’ll find situations involving bullying in school, spousal abuse, parental abuse, and suicide. Please note the spousal abuse is pretty graphic but nothing too crazy. The other trigger warnings are mentioned but not too descriptive. If any of these trigger you, please don’t read this book. The Vessel is a short novel that is well-written on a sentence-by-sentence basis, it is socially-grounded, intermittently creepy, and has some really powerful imagery. The individual elements are all strong but the connections between those elements are weak, under-developed, or outright bungled. Having finished The Vessel, I would love to know more about Jess’ psychological journey and the workings of the coven but neither of those things is in this book and so I am left both disappointed and frustrated.