All The Fiends of Hell

This book had so much potential.

The slow build up is great, personable and almost witty in places with the gradual onset of an indescribable cosmic horror that can't be directly seen but takes over the entire community, followed by the discovery of two young children and the instinct to protect them and survive at the same time, making for compelling and pleasing apocalyptic fiction.

But that's as good as it got for me and the rest of the book is downhill from there and bafflingly unscientific and implausible.

Adam Nevil describes every last detail in depth but drags the carefully planned first half down by relying on a predictable plot that's strangely restrictive and meandering at the same time.

In the excellent Misery, Stephen King explains the importance of continued plausibility to avoid shattering the credibility of a book, and by the end of Fiends it's feels like a convenient parting of the Red Sea.

A good effort that becomes less invigorating for turning a cosmic thriller into a pretty dumb and unrealistic romanticized slasher.

It has the survivalist feel of The Day of The Triffids but without existential overtones and the meaning of life.

This is my first book by Adam Nevill and I'm not condemning him, but this venture into sci-fi doesn't work and goes from an insightful thriller to an increasingly narrow cul-de-sac with nowhere to go.

Three stars is a fair rating as a semi-decent read in my personal and rather futile hunt for meaning through a chosen pathway of gristle and gore.

This is not an important or essential book and although reasonably well written and engrossing for the first half, is throwaway literature.

You can't win them all and I'm a bit disappointed for paying money and for finding just another author.