Apartment 16 (2010) by Adam Nevill

Apartment 16 (2010) by Adam Nevill: The least successful of Adam Nevill's horror novels that I've read (5 and counting, True Believers!). There are good things here, especially the characterization of co-protagonist Seth. But they're overwhelmed by the bad and the inconclusive.

Seth is a struggling artist who works as the Night Porter at an old and exclusive London condo. Very old, very exclusive. London, England. Initially terrified by strange night-time noises issuing from the titular apartment, Seth's days and nights have soon been infected by nightmares and visions. On the bright side, all this really jump-starts Seth's moribund career as a painter. On the dark side, his paintings now look an awful lot like the art of the long-missing artist who lived in Apartment 16.

Uh, oh.

Apryl Beckford is our other protagonist, a chipper American twenty-something who has come to the condo to settle up her late great-aunt's estate. That great aunt hadn't communicated with the American side of the family for decades. Apryl is about to find out why.

Essen, the missing artist who vanished in the late 1940's  about 60 years before the events of the novel, was an occult screwball with fascist tendencies. He also may have tapped into some sort of horrifying spiritual reality. That's certainly what Seth believes. And events will gradually convince Apryl, too. Moreover, Essen doesn't entirely appear to be missing any more. And why did one of the residents permanently secure Apartment 16, paying for it to remain forever empty?

As co-protagonist, Apryl seems frustratingly dense at times, especially when it comes to mounting danger. The novel is certainly playing with readerly expectations here, but in doing so, it instead plays into stereotypical 'women in peril' tropes. Really, really stereotypical, especially in a climax which is not all that climactic, and in which Apryl brings only a disposable lighter as a weapon to the Apocalypse. Hey, ho! 

Nevill's male protagonists in other novels that include The Ritual, Banquet For the Damned, and Under a Watchful Eye learn enough during their descents into darkness to make a fair showing against dire opponents in the climaxes of their novels. Apryl does not. It's certainly not intentionally sexist, but when compared to Nevill's sympathetic male protagonists (of which Seth is ultimately NOT one), she seems like an unfortunate return to the Screaming, Incompetent Girl.

A visit to a meeting of Essen's cultish fans by Apryl doesn't work so well either. They are stereotypes of fanboys and fangirls: they're smelly, have bad breath, and are pathetically excited by Apryl's fresh loveliness. It seems almost like parody, but of what, exactly? A bad day Nevill had at a horror convention? 

That scene throws one right out of the horrors of the novel, as does Apryl's fascination with a sexy (slightly) older male academic and art historian whose sexy sexiness derails every scene he's in, even when he's warning Apryl that she's not a dashing girl detective in a story. Thanks, sexy academic!

Seth is marvelously developed, though he too suffers at the end, suggesting as much Plot Device as Pity. Really, everyone does, because Apartment 16 ends up seeming like the first half of a much longer novel. No such novel has so far appeared. Until it does, I'd suggest avoiding Apartment 16. Not recommended.