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Lost Girl
How far will he go to save his daughter? How far will he go to get revenge?
It's 2053 and climate change has left billions homeless and starving - easy prey for the pandemics that sweep across the globe, scything through the refugee populations. Easy prey, too, for the violent gangs and people-smugglers who thrive in the crumbling world where 'King Death' reigns supreme.
The father's world went to hell two years ago. His four-year-old daughter was snatched from his garden when he should have been watching. The moments before her disappearance play in a perpetual loop in his mind. But the police aren't interested; amidst floods, hurricanes and global chaos, who cares about one more missing child? Now it's all down to him to find her, him alone . . .
It's 2053 and climate change has left billions homeless and starving - easy prey for the pandemics that sweep across the globe, scything through the refugee populations. Easy prey, too, for the violent gangs and people-smugglers who thrive in the crumbling world where 'King Death' reigns supreme.
The father's world went to hell two years ago. His four-year-old daughter was snatched from his garden when he should have been watching. The moments before her disappearance play in a perpetual loop in his mind. But the police aren't interested; amidst floods, hurricanes and global chaos, who cares about one more missing child? Now it's all down to him to find her, him alone . . .
448 pages, Kindle Edition
First published October 22, 2015
65 people are currently reading
1,909 people want to read
About the author
Adam L.G. Nevill
73books5,119followersADAM 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.
The author lives in Devon, England.
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.
The author lives in Devon, England.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 140 reviews
September 29, 2024
SO folks this was my top book of 2015. I had to re-read as knew parts of this book would have a lot of impevt right now in the world we live in. Adam Nevill seemed to predict events way back then. One of my favourite reads ever and would make a brilliant move.
THE NEXT BOOK YOU BUY NEEDS TO BE THIS! Mind-Blowing! 6 stars! Absolutely astonishing book.
This review has taken me a while to write as honestly I am still reeling from this book. It's like NOTHING I have read this year, funny enough it was an Adam Nevill novel last year that I read that also blew me away, he truly is an exceptional author and more readers need to dip their toes into the waters of his writing. This veers slightly away from some of his pure horror novels and in my opinion this is a book that should have made a bestseller list.
Adam writes to engage all your senses, his descriptions are simply incredible. From one page I can feel terror and fear, disgust, smell body odours and the reek of destruction, see evil and depravity and hear the sounds of death. Literally.
How far will he go to save his daughter? How far will he go to get revenge?
It's 2053 and climate change has left billions homeless and starving - easy prey for the pandemics that sweep across the globe, scything through the refugee populations. Easy prey, too, for the violent gangs and people-smugglers who thrive in the crumbling world where 'King Death' reigns supreme.
The father's world went to hell two years ago. His four-year-old daughter was snatched from his garden when he should have been watching. The moments before her disappearance play in a perpetual loop in his mind. But the police aren't interested; amidst floods, hurricanes and global chaos, who cares about one more missing child? Now it's all down to him to find her, him alone . . .
The book is set in the not too distant future and the world quite frankly has gone to crap. Climate change (you know, that thing they have been warning us about for YEARS?) has impacted the world in a million ways and it's not a pretty sight. Man has literally destroyed the planet. Food is scarce if not unavailable for the average person, everything we take for granted now has GONE. This book educated me on the very real world we might be heading towards if everybody does not do their bit. It impacted me more than any news story or documentary. Sobering indeed, as this may not be fiction. Don't believe me? Read it and tell me what you think.
The main character is known as "The Father" as that is what he is, it's his whole world after his 4 year old daughter was abducted from the family home in broad daylight. Every parents' worst nightmare, even worse in this new hell on earth that has been created. When the case gets pushed aside by the police he has only one option - to find her himself, and stop at NOTHING to do it.
This book is dark and hard to read at times, tackling child trafficking and sex slavery, paedophile rings, people trading, drugs, gangs, warlords and wicked people. Adam is known for his horror books but whilst this has some horrific moments that had me reading and reading for more it's not traditional horror, it would appeal to fans of a lot of genres. The Father enters worlds where no man has gone before and got out alive in his relentless pursuit of answers to where his daughter is and if she is even alive. Is she suffering? He can't bear to think about it but he is fully determined to find those that took his little princess. It changes him, forever. It has to.
The characters in this book are astoundingly good, some of the dark, depraved, despots he encounters just made my skin crawl and I had a lot of moments of holding my breath, I was THERE with him, in the room, it was the best type of reading escapism ever. You will be sucked in by this book from page one and no doubt will read it in one sitting as I did, each new development just made me want more. I had to know where his daughter ended up too. I just had to know. There is one particular character that enters the pages of the book and leaves one hell of an impression, you will know him when you meet him. I loved the elements of darkness and the supernatural weaved in cleverly to give the book a unique edge.
The book is violent, be prepared, but it's now a violent world and violence speaks louder than words. A passive man will get nowhere. The levels of complexity in this book are just stunning. Again, I say it - this is an author you have to discover. I am officially his biggest fan on the planet. Rave, rave, rave, rave...
You will not believe where the book goes with it's constant twists and turns, the reveals are mind-blowing, nothing will be the same again for you after reading this book. Nothing. It's sheer genius in every way - the plot, the characters, the reveals, the writing - everything. Just bloody read the book as this review is not doing it justice. Blimey, have I got the message over yet? I am exhausted now.
5 stars, even 6 stars even for this one. One of my favourite books EVER. A stunning, disturbing and suitably thrilling dark novel that can't be put down.
I received an advance copy of this book thanks to Adam and his Publisher and I’m still his No.1 Fan in 2024..
THE NEXT BOOK YOU BUY NEEDS TO BE THIS! Mind-Blowing! 6 stars! Absolutely astonishing book.
This review has taken me a while to write as honestly I am still reeling from this book. It's like NOTHING I have read this year, funny enough it was an Adam Nevill novel last year that I read that also blew me away, he truly is an exceptional author and more readers need to dip their toes into the waters of his writing. This veers slightly away from some of his pure horror novels and in my opinion this is a book that should have made a bestseller list.
Adam writes to engage all your senses, his descriptions are simply incredible. From one page I can feel terror and fear, disgust, smell body odours and the reek of destruction, see evil and depravity and hear the sounds of death. Literally.
How far will he go to save his daughter? How far will he go to get revenge?
It's 2053 and climate change has left billions homeless and starving - easy prey for the pandemics that sweep across the globe, scything through the refugee populations. Easy prey, too, for the violent gangs and people-smugglers who thrive in the crumbling world where 'King Death' reigns supreme.
The father's world went to hell two years ago. His four-year-old daughter was snatched from his garden when he should have been watching. The moments before her disappearance play in a perpetual loop in his mind. But the police aren't interested; amidst floods, hurricanes and global chaos, who cares about one more missing child? Now it's all down to him to find her, him alone . . .
The book is set in the not too distant future and the world quite frankly has gone to crap. Climate change (you know, that thing they have been warning us about for YEARS?) has impacted the world in a million ways and it's not a pretty sight. Man has literally destroyed the planet. Food is scarce if not unavailable for the average person, everything we take for granted now has GONE. This book educated me on the very real world we might be heading towards if everybody does not do their bit. It impacted me more than any news story or documentary. Sobering indeed, as this may not be fiction. Don't believe me? Read it and tell me what you think.
The main character is known as "The Father" as that is what he is, it's his whole world after his 4 year old daughter was abducted from the family home in broad daylight. Every parents' worst nightmare, even worse in this new hell on earth that has been created. When the case gets pushed aside by the police he has only one option - to find her himself, and stop at NOTHING to do it.
This book is dark and hard to read at times, tackling child trafficking and sex slavery, paedophile rings, people trading, drugs, gangs, warlords and wicked people. Adam is known for his horror books but whilst this has some horrific moments that had me reading and reading for more it's not traditional horror, it would appeal to fans of a lot of genres. The Father enters worlds where no man has gone before and got out alive in his relentless pursuit of answers to where his daughter is and if she is even alive. Is she suffering? He can't bear to think about it but he is fully determined to find those that took his little princess. It changes him, forever. It has to.
The characters in this book are astoundingly good, some of the dark, depraved, despots he encounters just made my skin crawl and I had a lot of moments of holding my breath, I was THERE with him, in the room, it was the best type of reading escapism ever. You will be sucked in by this book from page one and no doubt will read it in one sitting as I did, each new development just made me want more. I had to know where his daughter ended up too. I just had to know. There is one particular character that enters the pages of the book and leaves one hell of an impression, you will know him when you meet him. I loved the elements of darkness and the supernatural weaved in cleverly to give the book a unique edge.
The book is violent, be prepared, but it's now a violent world and violence speaks louder than words. A passive man will get nowhere. The levels of complexity in this book are just stunning. Again, I say it - this is an author you have to discover. I am officially his biggest fan on the planet. Rave, rave, rave, rave...
You will not believe where the book goes with it's constant twists and turns, the reveals are mind-blowing, nothing will be the same again for you after reading this book. Nothing. It's sheer genius in every way - the plot, the characters, the reveals, the writing - everything. Just bloody read the book as this review is not doing it justice. Blimey, have I got the message over yet? I am exhausted now.
5 stars, even 6 stars even for this one. One of my favourite books EVER. A stunning, disturbing and suitably thrilling dark novel that can't be put down.
I received an advance copy of this book thanks to Adam and his Publisher and I’m still his No.1 Fan in 2024..
November 28, 2015
There's a lot going on in this book!
Set around 2050 on an earth that is now a nightmarish worldscape of drought, fires, floods, war and rampant disease, a father searches for his abducted daughter.
A father is all I can call the man, because he's never given a name. I've thought on why that was and I haven't yet come up with a suitable answer. Perhaps that's to foster a certain distance from him in the reader? Because distance, or perhaps more accurately, disconnection, seems to be a theme here.
A disconnect from each other, (Am I my brother's keeper?), from the entire human population,(an overpopulation, as is often pointed out in the story), and from the earth overall; even a disconnect from our food and water supplies. We often aren't thinking about what humanity's effect on the earth will be, we just fill up our tanks, grill up our steaks and turn our water faucets on and have a drink.
The other main theme here is a bit of a trope: a man searching for his abducted daughter. In this respect, I don't feel any new ground was broken, though I was surprised at the final outcome.
For me, this book's world building was where the real story lived. I respect an imagination that can take current events and ramp them up realistically into large scale, worldwide tragedies. Sadly, at times I think this could be close to what actually happens, maybe what's already happening? For this reason, I think this thriller is a solid 4 star read.
Recommended for fans of thrillers and the "Taken" movies, but also for fans of imaginative world building that doesn't quite fit into the fantasy or sci-fi category.
*Thanks to Net Galley and the publisher for giving me this book in exchange for an honest review. This is it.*
Set around 2050 on an earth that is now a nightmarish worldscape of drought, fires, floods, war and rampant disease, a father searches for his abducted daughter.
A father is all I can call the man, because he's never given a name. I've thought on why that was and I haven't yet come up with a suitable answer. Perhaps that's to foster a certain distance from him in the reader? Because distance, or perhaps more accurately, disconnection, seems to be a theme here.
A disconnect from each other, (Am I my brother's keeper?), from the entire human population,(an overpopulation, as is often pointed out in the story), and from the earth overall; even a disconnect from our food and water supplies. We often aren't thinking about what humanity's effect on the earth will be, we just fill up our tanks, grill up our steaks and turn our water faucets on and have a drink.
The other main theme here is a bit of a trope: a man searching for his abducted daughter. In this respect, I don't feel any new ground was broken, though I was surprised at the final outcome.
For me, this book's world building was where the real story lived. I respect an imagination that can take current events and ramp them up realistically into large scale, worldwide tragedies. Sadly, at times I think this could be close to what actually happens, maybe what's already happening? For this reason, I think this thriller is a solid 4 star read.
Recommended for fans of thrillers and the "Taken" movies, but also for fans of imaginative world building that doesn't quite fit into the fantasy or sci-fi category.
*Thanks to Net Galley and the publisher for giving me this book in exchange for an honest review. This is it.*
August 15, 2022
There’s been a few books over the last number of years that have fallen into the category of “this book is the best book I’ve ever read but the worst reading experience I’ve ever had.� What I mean is that the book is phenomenal, lights out in every way possible, but also such a horrifying, gripping, emotional rollercoaster that tugs at certain core areas of your soul that you wish you’d never read it. Books such as Red X by David Demchuk, Odd Man Out by James Newman and Crossroads by Laurel Hightower. Now, enter, Lost Girl by Adam Nevill.
Over the last three or so years, I’ve been devouring all of Adam’s work and he’s become a sought after, must-read author for me. With an impending new arrival coming in October, fans of his work are getting excited. There’s still a few of his books I’ve not got to yet, but Lost Girl was one that I’ve been eyeballing with great excitement watching it climb up my TBR list.
Now that it’s not only arrived at the top but I’ve finished reading it, maybe I would’ve picked a different emotion than ‘excitement� over what this book has done to.
Quick aside � my wife and I have been together for many, many years. In fact, September of this year (2022) will mark 25 years together and eight years married. We met in high school and other than a couple one or two day spats where we ‘broke up� (ah those were the old days eh? well before cell phones and Facebook etc), we’ve been together through thick and thin. When we were significantly younger, we were told that most likely we’d never have kids. At least not unless we considered invitro. We were fine with that and we always lived with the understanding that if it happened, it happened, if not, it didn’t. As of writing this review, we’re two weeks away from our son turning six, which is truly crazy.
One thing I always mentally thought about when we didn’t have kids was that this world is a messed up place and I often had that discussion with friends and family about the “imagine bringing a kid into this world� trope. Funny enough, over the last few years, since Covid hit, everything that I used to bring up has essentially happened. Global pandemic, world leaders having temper tantrums and having to lay their man hoods on the table to show just how big their military penis� are, the rich getting richer while the poor continue to get beat down and pay higher taxes and of course, let’s not forget, no body who has any say or power regarding Global Warming and Climate Crisis issues seems to truly give a damn and are willing to do anything. The summer’s are hotter, the winters are colder, the crops are suffering, food cost is skyrocketing and all the while we keep trucking along.
So, what’s the point of my aside?
Well, that in a nut shell is the road Nevill goes down. Only, like a maniacal jerk who wanted to punish the reader with the worst torture possible, he decided to open this up with a heart breaking chapter and focus the book on a father trying to find his kidnapped daughter.
This book’s not for the weak of heart.
What I liked: The book begins with the character of the father, one whose name we never learn, getting ready to send a flirtatious email, while his four year old daughter plays outside. His wife comes into the house, they chat and she asks him to watch her. He’s preoccupied with this email and before he knows it, his daughter is grabbed. From there, Nevill never lets up and completely crushes every single ounce of humanity the reader has.
Set in the near future, food production has all but stopped, the rich funneling supplies to their personal pantries. The sea levels have risen drastically, people having to move and flee entire sections of the continents now that they’re underwater and through this governments have fallen and crime has increased 1000 fold. Add in International tensions, new and mutating viruses and pandemics and the reality that the world has become infinitely hotter, Nevill has crammed so much emotional damage within even the first 100 pages, that it’s hard to pull yourself out of the downward spiral of depression that leaks off each page.
But that’s not the worst aspect. The worst aspect is that kidnapping, child trafficking and sex trafficking has run amok, the police forces too overwhelmed to prioritize a few missing kids each day when so much more is happening in their jurisdictions. So, what does Nevill do? He has the father go after his daughter. A sort of John Wick meets Liam Neeson’s Taken character. A guy willing to do whatever it takes to find her and bring her back. It’s brutal, violent, unhinged and has an impact on him as he goes from a seeker to an active blood participant on viciousness, all the while justifying it knowing he’s looking when no one else is.
I loved seeing the downfall this singular act of his daughter being taken had on him, his wife and their family unit. It was heartbreaking and excruciating to read, but so solidly grounded in reality and how I imagine most families would fall apart and struggle to carry on after such an act.
The ending is truly powerful and it speaks to the masterful storytelling that Nevill possesses that it isn’t a Disney ending, it isn’t wrapped up in a neat bow and they sail off into the sunset to live happily ever after.
What I didn’t like: It worked so well for the storyline but I wasn’t a fan of the dark almost supernatural leanings that come along with a specific character and related to the gang that the father has to face down throughout. It almost felt as though some of Nevill’s novel Last Days was seeping into this story and honestly, while that would be great and would’ve been a solid thing to see on the written page again, I wanted this to remain grounded in the reality of the ‘real world� and have no otherworldly interference.
Why you should buy this: If you like blindfolding yourself, spreading your legs and having the closest person to your heart continuously kick you as hard as they can in your privates, then this book is for you. Over and over and over and over and over again Nevill crushes you and then increased the soul-brutalizing even within the next sentence. God, how I bawled throughout this. Look, we all know Nevill can write dark and scary and frightening stories. Look at The Ritual, Last Days, Apartment 16, The Reddening, Cunning Folk, Banquet for the Damned and No One Gets Out Alive as novels that people rave about time and time again. I myself still have to read the last two I listed up there, but I have no reason to believe they won’t rip me apart like the other books listed.
But this one. This one’s different. This was released in 2015, but now this novel will forever seem timeless. Pandemics and Climate Crises and just the downward trajectory we seem to be on create a stench that seeps off of these pages and permeates the air around you as you read it. This is a book with a stench, but one so horrifically powerful you’ll push it aside to see what happens.
I’m on the fence if this is my favorite Nevill book, but I do know this is a book I’ll never forget and one I think everyone who’s yet to read it to take a weekend, turn off the cellphone and clear your schedule and curl up in a ball and dive in. You’ll be cursing his name the entire time, but you won’t be able to put it down. Just amazing.
Well done, Adam. You’re a jerk of the worst kind.
Over the last three or so years, I’ve been devouring all of Adam’s work and he’s become a sought after, must-read author for me. With an impending new arrival coming in October, fans of his work are getting excited. There’s still a few of his books I’ve not got to yet, but Lost Girl was one that I’ve been eyeballing with great excitement watching it climb up my TBR list.
Now that it’s not only arrived at the top but I’ve finished reading it, maybe I would’ve picked a different emotion than ‘excitement� over what this book has done to.
Quick aside � my wife and I have been together for many, many years. In fact, September of this year (2022) will mark 25 years together and eight years married. We met in high school and other than a couple one or two day spats where we ‘broke up� (ah those were the old days eh? well before cell phones and Facebook etc), we’ve been together through thick and thin. When we were significantly younger, we were told that most likely we’d never have kids. At least not unless we considered invitro. We were fine with that and we always lived with the understanding that if it happened, it happened, if not, it didn’t. As of writing this review, we’re two weeks away from our son turning six, which is truly crazy.
One thing I always mentally thought about when we didn’t have kids was that this world is a messed up place and I often had that discussion with friends and family about the “imagine bringing a kid into this world� trope. Funny enough, over the last few years, since Covid hit, everything that I used to bring up has essentially happened. Global pandemic, world leaders having temper tantrums and having to lay their man hoods on the table to show just how big their military penis� are, the rich getting richer while the poor continue to get beat down and pay higher taxes and of course, let’s not forget, no body who has any say or power regarding Global Warming and Climate Crisis issues seems to truly give a damn and are willing to do anything. The summer’s are hotter, the winters are colder, the crops are suffering, food cost is skyrocketing and all the while we keep trucking along.
So, what’s the point of my aside?
Well, that in a nut shell is the road Nevill goes down. Only, like a maniacal jerk who wanted to punish the reader with the worst torture possible, he decided to open this up with a heart breaking chapter and focus the book on a father trying to find his kidnapped daughter.
This book’s not for the weak of heart.
What I liked: The book begins with the character of the father, one whose name we never learn, getting ready to send a flirtatious email, while his four year old daughter plays outside. His wife comes into the house, they chat and she asks him to watch her. He’s preoccupied with this email and before he knows it, his daughter is grabbed. From there, Nevill never lets up and completely crushes every single ounce of humanity the reader has.
Set in the near future, food production has all but stopped, the rich funneling supplies to their personal pantries. The sea levels have risen drastically, people having to move and flee entire sections of the continents now that they’re underwater and through this governments have fallen and crime has increased 1000 fold. Add in International tensions, new and mutating viruses and pandemics and the reality that the world has become infinitely hotter, Nevill has crammed so much emotional damage within even the first 100 pages, that it’s hard to pull yourself out of the downward spiral of depression that leaks off each page.
But that’s not the worst aspect. The worst aspect is that kidnapping, child trafficking and sex trafficking has run amok, the police forces too overwhelmed to prioritize a few missing kids each day when so much more is happening in their jurisdictions. So, what does Nevill do? He has the father go after his daughter. A sort of John Wick meets Liam Neeson’s Taken character. A guy willing to do whatever it takes to find her and bring her back. It’s brutal, violent, unhinged and has an impact on him as he goes from a seeker to an active blood participant on viciousness, all the while justifying it knowing he’s looking when no one else is.
I loved seeing the downfall this singular act of his daughter being taken had on him, his wife and their family unit. It was heartbreaking and excruciating to read, but so solidly grounded in reality and how I imagine most families would fall apart and struggle to carry on after such an act.
The ending is truly powerful and it speaks to the masterful storytelling that Nevill possesses that it isn’t a Disney ending, it isn’t wrapped up in a neat bow and they sail off into the sunset to live happily ever after.
What I didn’t like: It worked so well for the storyline but I wasn’t a fan of the dark almost supernatural leanings that come along with a specific character and related to the gang that the father has to face down throughout. It almost felt as though some of Nevill’s novel Last Days was seeping into this story and honestly, while that would be great and would’ve been a solid thing to see on the written page again, I wanted this to remain grounded in the reality of the ‘real world� and have no otherworldly interference.
Why you should buy this: If you like blindfolding yourself, spreading your legs and having the closest person to your heart continuously kick you as hard as they can in your privates, then this book is for you. Over and over and over and over and over again Nevill crushes you and then increased the soul-brutalizing even within the next sentence. God, how I bawled throughout this. Look, we all know Nevill can write dark and scary and frightening stories. Look at The Ritual, Last Days, Apartment 16, The Reddening, Cunning Folk, Banquet for the Damned and No One Gets Out Alive as novels that people rave about time and time again. I myself still have to read the last two I listed up there, but I have no reason to believe they won’t rip me apart like the other books listed.
But this one. This one’s different. This was released in 2015, but now this novel will forever seem timeless. Pandemics and Climate Crises and just the downward trajectory we seem to be on create a stench that seeps off of these pages and permeates the air around you as you read it. This is a book with a stench, but one so horrifically powerful you’ll push it aside to see what happens.
I’m on the fence if this is my favorite Nevill book, but I do know this is a book I’ll never forget and one I think everyone who’s yet to read it to take a weekend, turn off the cellphone and clear your schedule and curl up in a ball and dive in. You’ll be cursing his name the entire time, but you won’t be able to put it down. Just amazing.
Well done, Adam. You’re a jerk of the worst kind.
October 18, 2024
In a near future Great Britain , which is struggling to cope with a pandemic, out of control climate change and economic collapse, an unnamed father embarks upon a descent into hell as he searches for his daughter who had been abducted two years earlier.
Lost Girl was a gripping psychological horror, but my word was it grim.
The future as Adam Nevill sees it is very scary indeed and entirely plausible.
The father, as he searches for his daughter, finds himself having to compromise his morality and committing greater acts of violence. This was really well done and felt authentic.
The writing was very good indeed, stripped back to the bone and fast-paced.
Some great characters, especially one who has a distinct Hellraiser vibe about him, giving a sense that something truly supernatural and horrific is waiting in the wings to take advantage of the chaos.
Very good but unrelentingly bleak, I finished this book feeling distinctly uneasy.
Lost Girl was a gripping psychological horror, but my word was it grim.
The future as Adam Nevill sees it is very scary indeed and entirely plausible.
The father, as he searches for his daughter, finds himself having to compromise his morality and committing greater acts of violence. This was really well done and felt authentic.
The writing was very good indeed, stripped back to the bone and fast-paced.
Some great characters, especially one who has a distinct Hellraiser vibe about him, giving a sense that something truly supernatural and horrific is waiting in the wings to take advantage of the chaos.
Very good but unrelentingly bleak, I finished this book feeling distinctly uneasy.
October 9, 2015
In a near future England, caught in the upheaval of the ongoing apocalyptic changes brought on by global warming....rising ocean levels, shifting weather patterns, the European populace in flux, famine, plagues, a collapsing infrastructure, and rampant crime....a little girl vanishes from her yard, and her father sets out to find her, at any cost.
An interesting thriller, well written, with a few striking moments and images that linger in the reader's mind.....yet, in my opinion, fails to engage any empathy at all. Don't get me wrong, I'm a huge vigilante/hero/anti-hero fan, but the father character simply doesn't connect on any emotional level. He goes from mildly despicable to a faceless non-entity going through the motions, paying lip service instead of viscerally reacting to what he witnesses and what he does to find his child.
This was an eARC from Netgalley.
An interesting thriller, well written, with a few striking moments and images that linger in the reader's mind.....yet, in my opinion, fails to engage any empathy at all. Don't get me wrong, I'm a huge vigilante/hero/anti-hero fan, but the father character simply doesn't connect on any emotional level. He goes from mildly despicable to a faceless non-entity going through the motions, paying lip service instead of viscerally reacting to what he witnesses and what he does to find his child.
This was an eARC from Netgalley.
June 5, 2020
A heart Breaking Story About a Father that loses his Young daughter. I have to say in the beginning the book was a bit annoying, don't quit know why, but after reading further, and further i couldn't put the book down!
June 16, 2018
I’m a fan of Adam Nevill, the British horror writer, but I’m not sure about Lost Girl, a book that blends sci fi, thriller and horror.
The novel is set in the near future in a world ravaged by the effects of climate change. Severe climactic conditions have left parts of the world uninhabitable, causing uncontrollable waves of migration, which in turn leave parts of the world eg Britain, overcrowded, ungovernable, crime ridden and failing.
Set against this backdrop is the story of a child abduction and the quest of a flawed man, known throughout as ‘the father�, to find his daughter.
The imagined future is effective, thought provoking and scary. The plot moves logically and is exciting in parts.
I just found that some scenes went on too long. Some of the scary parts are extremely wordy in an attempt to squeeze every last shudder, every creepy horrific detail from a situation. Some tense scenes will pause as a character philosophises for pages and pages. Someone’s mental anguish will be described in slow and exhaustive detail ........ all serving to slow the narrative down and make the writing seem, at times, a bit leaden.
That said, the premise is imaginative and original, the writing is generally very good and you really do want to know how the story ends.
Ps The Ritual and Last Days by Adam Neville are, I think, modern horror classics and much recommended.
The novel is set in the near future in a world ravaged by the effects of climate change. Severe climactic conditions have left parts of the world uninhabitable, causing uncontrollable waves of migration, which in turn leave parts of the world eg Britain, overcrowded, ungovernable, crime ridden and failing.
Set against this backdrop is the story of a child abduction and the quest of a flawed man, known throughout as ‘the father�, to find his daughter.
The imagined future is effective, thought provoking and scary. The plot moves logically and is exciting in parts.
I just found that some scenes went on too long. Some of the scary parts are extremely wordy in an attempt to squeeze every last shudder, every creepy horrific detail from a situation. Some tense scenes will pause as a character philosophises for pages and pages. Someone’s mental anguish will be described in slow and exhaustive detail ........ all serving to slow the narrative down and make the writing seem, at times, a bit leaden.
That said, the premise is imaginative and original, the writing is generally very good and you really do want to know how the story ends.
Ps The Ritual and Last Days by Adam Neville are, I think, modern horror classics and much recommended.
January 20, 2023
This was so different than anything I’ve read from Adam Nevil before. But like most books are red by him, this was amazing. The dystopian world was so interesting to explore. It really put a new twist on the kidnap daughter story. Even though that kind of three has been done to death, that’s where he put a new twist to it. It was a fun read from start to finish and I know I’m going to re-read this one multiple times.
February 7, 2016
This was a decent thriller but I read Nevill because his horror novels scare the ever living shit out of me. This wasn't that. If you've read him and like him you may want to check this out. If you've never read him, I wouldn't recommend starting with this one. Go with or .
December 6, 2015
More apocalyptic fiction, but this time from the mind of Adam Nevill. Against the backdrop of a swiftly escalating ecological disaster, comes the intimate story of a family being torn apart by a kidnapping.
The main character, a father (who is never explicitly named), is utterly focused on a single task. He will stop at nothing to find his daughter. In many respects this novel is a study of his character. The further he travels, the longer he takes on his journey, the more the narrative strips away elements of his being. His attitudes and limits evolve (or perhaps that should be devolve?) throughout the weeks and months that pass. The person who exists at the end of this exploration is markedly different from the character who we meet at the beginning. It is fascinating to see the transformation that occurs.
A word of warning, it is likely that some readers will find this particular novel too much of a trigger. I have a friend who can’t read anything that involves violence, or the threat of violence, towards children. I don’t imagine that this is the book for them. Personally, I think Nevill does an excellent job of portraying dark and, oft times, difficult subject matter with a delicate touch. The actions and reactions between the characters never feel over the top or staged.
This book will, however, most definitely promote a certain amount of introspection. What would you do to save your loved ones? How much do they mean to you and are there lines you would be prepared to cross? It would be a hard soul who didn’t find themselves asking these sorts of questions after reading Lost Girl.
Yes, there are flashes of extreme violence dotted throughout the narrative but, from my perspective at least, Lost Girl feels far more concerned in exploring the psychological horror that the father is experiencing. He has given up everything in pursuit of his daughter. His physical and mental health are both deteriorating, but he is consumed with the thought that if he can just find her everything will be ok. He is longing for that picture perfect storybook happy ending. Delusional, perhaps, but it really makes all the heartbreak and sorrow he is experiencing feel that much more honest. The seemingly endless mental anguish he is forced to endure is often harrowing, but in the same breath utterly riveting.
The apocalyptic content in this novel is in some ways is almost inconsequential. You could entirely remove any mention of it and still have an absolutely engrossing tale. The one thing that the environmental cataclysm does do is provide an additional sense of urgency to the father’s already fraught search. The most frightening/horrific thing about Nevill’s description of the world ending? It all sounds so bloody familiar, it feels completely real. Escalations in violent crime, an ongoing refugee crisis, uncontrollable pandemics, political and economic land grabs. These could all be symptoms pulled from the headlines of just about newspaper today.
As with No One Gets Out Alive, Adam Nevill has proven he has a real knack when it comes to defying my expectations. His novels have this delightfully dark tone, and the narrative tends to veer off in unexpected ways. I’ve come to expect that I don’t know what to expect with his writing. I love it when you discover an author whose work is defiantly challenging and forces you to think about your view of the world.
Every time I see Adam Nevill at any book related event he appears to be a happy, smiley, thoroughly well adjusted chap. I think I finally understand why. All the fears that would normally fester internally goes into his writing. It must be a hugely cathartic experience to expel all those personal demons. Damn it all, it works for me. It makes for first class horror fiction.
The main character, a father (who is never explicitly named), is utterly focused on a single task. He will stop at nothing to find his daughter. In many respects this novel is a study of his character. The further he travels, the longer he takes on his journey, the more the narrative strips away elements of his being. His attitudes and limits evolve (or perhaps that should be devolve?) throughout the weeks and months that pass. The person who exists at the end of this exploration is markedly different from the character who we meet at the beginning. It is fascinating to see the transformation that occurs.
A word of warning, it is likely that some readers will find this particular novel too much of a trigger. I have a friend who can’t read anything that involves violence, or the threat of violence, towards children. I don’t imagine that this is the book for them. Personally, I think Nevill does an excellent job of portraying dark and, oft times, difficult subject matter with a delicate touch. The actions and reactions between the characters never feel over the top or staged.
This book will, however, most definitely promote a certain amount of introspection. What would you do to save your loved ones? How much do they mean to you and are there lines you would be prepared to cross? It would be a hard soul who didn’t find themselves asking these sorts of questions after reading Lost Girl.
Yes, there are flashes of extreme violence dotted throughout the narrative but, from my perspective at least, Lost Girl feels far more concerned in exploring the psychological horror that the father is experiencing. He has given up everything in pursuit of his daughter. His physical and mental health are both deteriorating, but he is consumed with the thought that if he can just find her everything will be ok. He is longing for that picture perfect storybook happy ending. Delusional, perhaps, but it really makes all the heartbreak and sorrow he is experiencing feel that much more honest. The seemingly endless mental anguish he is forced to endure is often harrowing, but in the same breath utterly riveting.
The apocalyptic content in this novel is in some ways is almost inconsequential. You could entirely remove any mention of it and still have an absolutely engrossing tale. The one thing that the environmental cataclysm does do is provide an additional sense of urgency to the father’s already fraught search. The most frightening/horrific thing about Nevill’s description of the world ending? It all sounds so bloody familiar, it feels completely real. Escalations in violent crime, an ongoing refugee crisis, uncontrollable pandemics, political and economic land grabs. These could all be symptoms pulled from the headlines of just about newspaper today.
As with No One Gets Out Alive, Adam Nevill has proven he has a real knack when it comes to defying my expectations. His novels have this delightfully dark tone, and the narrative tends to veer off in unexpected ways. I’ve come to expect that I don’t know what to expect with his writing. I love it when you discover an author whose work is defiantly challenging and forces you to think about your view of the world.
Every time I see Adam Nevill at any book related event he appears to be a happy, smiley, thoroughly well adjusted chap. I think I finally understand why. All the fears that would normally fester internally goes into his writing. It must be a hugely cathartic experience to expel all those personal demons. Damn it all, it works for me. It makes for first class horror fiction.
December 1, 2015
An author not afraid to experiment This work of fiction is probably best described as “dystopian� as it refers to the world or sees the creation in the world of a degraded society that is generally headed to an irreversible oblivion. Indeed the writing is at times so stark and raw that the descriptive prose takes on an almost apocalyptic feel. “The father might have become a wanderer in ancient times, put ashore in a sweltering hive of pirates, slaves, cut-throats, urchins and pickpockets, the dusty and desperate, wide-eyed beseechers and apostles of mutating faiths, increasingly confirmed by the signs of the end of times; all driven here from places baked to clay and burned to dust, arriving at a town besieged and battered by a remorseless yet increasingly lifeless sea.�
The father (we never get to know his real name, and the constant use of the noun is a little irritating) is searching for his daughter Penny who was kidnapped from their home in Torquay. The setting is 2053 and a very different and dysfunctional world than the present day. There is a mass migration of people from southern Europe and Africa creating a frenzy of resettlement and swathes of land in London and Liverpool flooded and swollen. A pandemic is spreading through the populations of Europe. There are chronic water shortages, fires, and droughts and old enemies are beginning to once again seek to destroy each other.
On his journey the father stops at the only pub in Brixham still open above the harbour. As he sips his locally brewed beer, seated comfortably at the window the old man next to him begins a conversation. This wily old stranger is one of many examples that Adam Nevill uses so brilliantly to create visual picture of a world in meltdown…”The old man wiped his beard. The planet’s been more than patient. It was around for over four billion years before we set the first fires to clear the land. But it only took ten thousand years in this inter-glacial period for us to spread like a virus. We were the mad shepherds who didn’t even finish a shift before we poisoned the farm and set fire to the barn. We’ve overheated the earth and dried it out. So it’s time for us to leave, I think. Don’t you?�
Built around a disintegrating and fractured country the father must continue his search. He brutally annihilates suspected pedophiles and in the process finds himself pursued by the feared gang King Death “Some kind of religion mixed with the worst kind of human behavior. Like the jihadists, but without an ultimate goal�
The author’s writing and style reminded me in some ways of The Road by Cormac McCarthy; an apocalyptic journey of a father and son across a landscape blasted by an unspecified cataclysm. From the very open sentence the reader is captivated…”The last time he had seen his daughter, she’d been in the front garden. Two years ago.�
This is certainly different to previous novels by Adam Nevill, his direct approach and well researched intelligent storytelling shows an author with a genuine flair for the imaginative and one who is not afraid to experiment.
The father (we never get to know his real name, and the constant use of the noun is a little irritating) is searching for his daughter Penny who was kidnapped from their home in Torquay. The setting is 2053 and a very different and dysfunctional world than the present day. There is a mass migration of people from southern Europe and Africa creating a frenzy of resettlement and swathes of land in London and Liverpool flooded and swollen. A pandemic is spreading through the populations of Europe. There are chronic water shortages, fires, and droughts and old enemies are beginning to once again seek to destroy each other.
On his journey the father stops at the only pub in Brixham still open above the harbour. As he sips his locally brewed beer, seated comfortably at the window the old man next to him begins a conversation. This wily old stranger is one of many examples that Adam Nevill uses so brilliantly to create visual picture of a world in meltdown…”The old man wiped his beard. The planet’s been more than patient. It was around for over four billion years before we set the first fires to clear the land. But it only took ten thousand years in this inter-glacial period for us to spread like a virus. We were the mad shepherds who didn’t even finish a shift before we poisoned the farm and set fire to the barn. We’ve overheated the earth and dried it out. So it’s time for us to leave, I think. Don’t you?�
Built around a disintegrating and fractured country the father must continue his search. He brutally annihilates suspected pedophiles and in the process finds himself pursued by the feared gang King Death “Some kind of religion mixed with the worst kind of human behavior. Like the jihadists, but without an ultimate goal�
The author’s writing and style reminded me in some ways of The Road by Cormac McCarthy; an apocalyptic journey of a father and son across a landscape blasted by an unspecified cataclysm. From the very open sentence the reader is captivated…”The last time he had seen his daughter, she’d been in the front garden. Two years ago.�
This is certainly different to previous novels by Adam Nevill, his direct approach and well researched intelligent storytelling shows an author with a genuine flair for the imaginative and one who is not afraid to experiment.
May 18, 2024
The beginning of this was a bit of a slog for me. I'm not into climate change dystopian fiction. Not that I don't think that it's happening for real. I've just listened to doom prognosticators for too long. It tends to make the fiction boring. The progression of pandemics was kind of interesting, especially since he wrote the book before our own covid outbreak.
But, this is Nevill, so I had faith, and I was rewarded. The character arc of the father was intense. The story eventually bloomed into much more than was promised by the beginning of the book. Good, bloody horror.
5/18/2024 Edit:
Edit: I almost forgot about this!
The Central Americans who died against the fence in the United States after the Mormons came into office.
That single sentence took me out of the story and made me think. Mostly because I'm in the US, but also because it was so bizarre to me. Mormons in the US did something horrible enough to make it memorable to the entire world? On the border? I had to stop reading for a bit to puzzle it out. Did he mean the traditionalist, polygamist Mormon sects? That would be incredibly weird, because Mormons of that sort are very reclusive, and a small and separatist cult.
Did he mean Mormons in general? Because that idea is insulting. Mormons are no different from the majority of other Christians in the US. We have our weird cultists and literalists here, but the rest are good, decent people. They would be fighting for their families, and for the lives of others, including Central Americans. The Mormon church has a huge membership in Central America.
OTOH, someone could take that single sentence and extrapolate a wild story from it. Maybe throw in some snake handlers who have been speaking in tongues to a wild and crazy cosmic god all their lives. That would be so freaking cool.
But, this is Nevill, so I had faith, and I was rewarded. The character arc of the father was intense. The story eventually bloomed into much more than was promised by the beginning of the book. Good, bloody horror.
5/18/2024 Edit:
Edit: I almost forgot about this!
The Central Americans who died against the fence in the United States after the Mormons came into office.
That single sentence took me out of the story and made me think. Mostly because I'm in the US, but also because it was so bizarre to me. Mormons in the US did something horrible enough to make it memorable to the entire world? On the border? I had to stop reading for a bit to puzzle it out. Did he mean the traditionalist, polygamist Mormon sects? That would be incredibly weird, because Mormons of that sort are very reclusive, and a small and separatist cult.
Did he mean Mormons in general? Because that idea is insulting. Mormons are no different from the majority of other Christians in the US. We have our weird cultists and literalists here, but the rest are good, decent people. They would be fighting for their families, and for the lives of others, including Central Americans. The Mormon church has a huge membership in Central America.
OTOH, someone could take that single sentence and extrapolate a wild story from it. Maybe throw in some snake handlers who have been speaking in tongues to a wild and crazy cosmic god all their lives. That would be so freaking cool.
August 20, 2021
I am almost done reading all of the books from this author with only a couple left. I had put this one back a while, as it seemed not to be his usual style. That is right but does not at all suggest it is any less worth reading. You may probably know Nevill for his great quality macabre chilling tales of terror. He departs from that genre slightly here to give us a near future dystopian thriller. Though it has the feel of a modern gritty thriller it does also still contain horror elements as is an uncomfortable and intense read. Having read all of the author's book except the one following this and his newest release I did clearly notice quite a change to his writing style. I expect this was a conscious decision and also natural evolution of his writing style. It first I was slightly surprised and almost disappointed but the slightly more mainstream contemporary style suits the story and subgenre.
This is still a horror tale, only this time Nevill presents us with what could be a genuinely terrifying horror-that of our child being kidnapped or taken suddenly and mysteriously. What do we do to get them back? How far do we go? There may be a number of modern thriller books with a similar starting point but Nevill gives this tale a backdrop of dystopian future of around thirty years from now where extreme climate chaos, pandemic and social and economic breakdown has ruined society globally. With government and police even more unreliable, a specific lawless gang have spread over the country and may be connected to the reason for the father's daughter disappearing.
Though different to almost all the other books by this author, it is a great book-challenging and emotional and presents a number of questions about how we may survive in a possible near future.
This is still a horror tale, only this time Nevill presents us with what could be a genuinely terrifying horror-that of our child being kidnapped or taken suddenly and mysteriously. What do we do to get them back? How far do we go? There may be a number of modern thriller books with a similar starting point but Nevill gives this tale a backdrop of dystopian future of around thirty years from now where extreme climate chaos, pandemic and social and economic breakdown has ruined society globally. With government and police even more unreliable, a specific lawless gang have spread over the country and may be connected to the reason for the father's daughter disappearing.
Though different to almost all the other books by this author, it is a great book-challenging and emotional and presents a number of questions about how we may survive in a possible near future.
September 21, 2016
Well, here’s a grim, bleak dystopian yarn designed to rudely kick out all your joie de vivre.
Not too far in the future, global warming has fully taken hold, the water levels have risen and there’s large scale diaspora; as well as famine, disease and the collapse of law and order. That’s all in the background though. Our protagonist is a father whose little girl was stolen from him and his wife two years earlier. He’s now basically gone full ‘Death Wish� and is hunting down and torturing or killing anyone who can lead him towards his missing daughter. He’s a brutal, brutalised and brutalising man, so not a barrel of laughs. And that’s before he stumbles across a vicious death cult.
On the back cover there’s a quote from The Guardian saying that Nevill is “Britain’s answer to Stephen King�. That’s hardly accurate though, as no matter what the tale, King does try to layer on some trademark homespun good humour. Now obviously this would be a hard book in which to cram some laugh out loud, thigh-slapping jokes, but in never ever trying to lighten the mood Nevill does create a book work is simultaneously gripping and a trudge to read. ‘Lost Girl� was compelling and I was always fascinated as to what was going to happen next, but I’m, not sure that I ever really enjoyed it.
Not too far in the future, global warming has fully taken hold, the water levels have risen and there’s large scale diaspora; as well as famine, disease and the collapse of law and order. That’s all in the background though. Our protagonist is a father whose little girl was stolen from him and his wife two years earlier. He’s now basically gone full ‘Death Wish� and is hunting down and torturing or killing anyone who can lead him towards his missing daughter. He’s a brutal, brutalised and brutalising man, so not a barrel of laughs. And that’s before he stumbles across a vicious death cult.
On the back cover there’s a quote from The Guardian saying that Nevill is “Britain’s answer to Stephen King�. That’s hardly accurate though, as no matter what the tale, King does try to layer on some trademark homespun good humour. Now obviously this would be a hard book in which to cram some laugh out loud, thigh-slapping jokes, but in never ever trying to lighten the mood Nevill does create a book work is simultaneously gripping and a trudge to read. ‘Lost Girl� was compelling and I was always fascinated as to what was going to happen next, but I’m, not sure that I ever really enjoyed it.
October 21, 2018
Well that was a heart-wrenching read... I've read the rest of Mr Nevill's books and loved them, but put off reading Lost Girl until now. Kidnapped child you say? Hyperrealistic climate crisis near-future you say? Sounds like the absolute pits of despair to me. And it pretty much is, justifying my reluctance to read it. But such is the author's skill that when I did brave it I was immediately sucked in and drawn down into those pits of despair and horror. I've emerged the other end alive, but distinctly shaken. Another excellent piece of work from Adam Nevill, but definitely not a feel-good story.
September 8, 2017
Great premise which ended a bit abruptly.
October 25, 2016
is a searing novel by about the all-too-close-to-reality possibilities that await us as the world becomes more crowded, more affected by climate change and less hospitable to humanity. However, it's not just a commentary on our present and fast accelerating condition. Instead, Nevill manages to weave fine touches of horror storytelling into his tale and link this terrible tale to his other works with subtle references as well. As always, masterfully written and astonishingly well crafted. Well done, Mr. Nevill!
Lost Girl is a prescient and powerful story of the end of days. In fact, it is a story of the near-future set in a world that is only a minute away by any measure, where climate change-caused immigration and urban uprising have become a critical crisis, and the world is fast falling apart. In the midst of such upheaval, one man must find his missing daughter and confront a risen horror that is taking advantage of the chaos. Adam Nevill is one of the master storytellers, and this is his most incisive story yet. Highly recommended, but only if you can keep your eyes open as the darkness rises and rises around you. Powerful stuff: an amazing work by an astounding writer.
Lost Girl is a prescient and powerful story of the end of days. In fact, it is a story of the near-future set in a world that is only a minute away by any measure, where climate change-caused immigration and urban uprising have become a critical crisis, and the world is fast falling apart. In the midst of such upheaval, one man must find his missing daughter and confront a risen horror that is taking advantage of the chaos. Adam Nevill is one of the master storytellers, and this is his most incisive story yet. Highly recommended, but only if you can keep your eyes open as the darkness rises and rises around you. Powerful stuff: an amazing work by an astounding writer.
November 3, 2015
Having thoroughly enjoyed my two previous excursions into the dark mind of Adam Nevill, and with the promise of a near future setting and a foreboding premise, I was eager to devour this book. Adam sets the horrific story of a father searching for his abducted daughter in a world ravaged by ecological disaster.
Unusually I think it is this setting that will give me the most nightmares. Intensively researched, this is a future that the author clearly believes possible, if not inevitable. Should you share this view, you cannot help but be extremely disturbed by this vivid depiction. The helplessness this engenders is echoed by the claustrophobic journey endured by the never named father.
In clumsier hands this could still have been an interesting book, but this is more than that. The style is literary and gothic, blending the extreme with the almost surreal. Imaginative descriptive skills lambast you with more shades of black than you previously thought possible. The pace is relentless, making for a genuine ‘page turner�, tight editing ensuring that the densely woven prose never strays from hammering the reader into submission. I apologise for waxing somewhat lyrical about this novel, but suffice to say that it is extremely good. Recommended for the strong of heart.
Unusually I think it is this setting that will give me the most nightmares. Intensively researched, this is a future that the author clearly believes possible, if not inevitable. Should you share this view, you cannot help but be extremely disturbed by this vivid depiction. The helplessness this engenders is echoed by the claustrophobic journey endured by the never named father.
In clumsier hands this could still have been an interesting book, but this is more than that. The style is literary and gothic, blending the extreme with the almost surreal. Imaginative descriptive skills lambast you with more shades of black than you previously thought possible. The pace is relentless, making for a genuine ‘page turner�, tight editing ensuring that the densely woven prose never strays from hammering the reader into submission. I apologise for waxing somewhat lyrical about this novel, but suffice to say that it is extremely good. Recommended for the strong of heart.
January 21, 2016
2 Stars
I started and stopped this bleak tale more than a dozen times. It is time to put it away for a while. I am a huge fan of Adam Nevill but could not stay focused on this depressing tale. I will come back and start over another time.
I started and stopped this bleak tale more than a dozen times. It is time to put it away for a while. I am a huge fan of Adam Nevill but could not stay focused on this depressing tale. I will come back and start over another time.
June 25, 2021
Read like a Liam Neeson movie.
I enjoy Adam Nevill's books, but this wasn't one of my favorite. Seemed more thrillerish than horror.
I enjoy Adam Nevill's books, but this wasn't one of my favorite. Seemed more thrillerish than horror.
October 13, 2015
I'm grateful to the publisher for an e-copy of this book via NetGalley.
"Lost Girl" is the story of a missing child, and a father. As the world goes to hell, he focusses on his search for her. At any cost, whoever dies, whatever pain he has to suffer, he will find her.
Two years ago, Penny disappeared. She was playing in the garden by herself: her father, who should have been watching her, was upstairs, flirting by email. Is that why he is so driven to trace her, get her back? Is it guilt? Is it an attempt to atone, to flee from the empty life that's left after she was taken? Nevill doesn't quite tell us, preferring instead to communicate the simple fact of the father's drivenness, amplified by the fact that we never learn his name: throughout the book he remains, simply, the father.
This singleminded hunt is heightened because of the background to the novel. It is 2051, and runaway global warming has taken hold. The summers become hotter every year, crops are failing even in relatively buffered Britain, forest fires and droughts sweep the globe and India and Pakistan are on the verge of war over the declining rivers. A mass movement of refugees crosses Europe ("more and more coming in every day in great noisy leviathans of motion and colour and tired faces") and the population of the UK stands at 90 million (or 100, or 120... the Emergency Government isn't sure). Nationalists, jihadists and crime syndicates strut their stuff. Disease sweeps the globe (it's like the Four Horsemen have found a new partner,and enabler in climate change). Nobody has time or attention for one missing four year old. Except the father. Has he the right, we wonder, to pursue his own crusade like this? But if he doesn't who, who will?
It turns out that there are few like-minded souls who are happy to cooperate - or perhaps, one might think, use the father for their own ends, threatening sex offenders and imposing a kind of wild justice. It's a murky area and he'll take any help he can get - from the woman he only ever hears on the phone (except once...) and who he calls Scarlett Johansson, from the man who becomes Gene Hackman. They support the father, arm him and supply information - but can they really control what they've created?
Nevill's two most recent books, No One Gets Out Alive and House of Small Shadows have been unequivocal horror, albeit of a special kind: not so much spooks and spirits as the despair to be found in a dusty, abandoned country house or a rundown inner city terrace full of rustling plastic sheets and sticky, unwashed crockery. Here he maintains the emphasis on the seedy - as the world winds down, the father inhabits a string of decaying B&Bs, living off processed soya and Welsh rum. For normal people the world is going to rack and ruin. Only the super rich, or the criminal gangs, have any normality left. But the supernatural? The horror? Well, you'll have to decide, and you can call this a near future thriller or SF if you want, but for me, the horror (the horror!) is rather more stark because it is a credible portrait of what might actually happen, not a piece of fantasy. Perhaps we need more horror like this to shock us into action.
So while this book is not quite what I'd come to expect from Nevill, it is, I'd say, quite properly a horror story and the writing is superb (perhaps a little info-dumpy in places, maybe a few too many lists) but haunting, eloquent and deeply troubling: "...a never-ending carousel of flame, black smoke, glass-strewn streets, bodies under tarpaulins, riot shields glittering in sunlight, placards, aerial footage of felled buildings in other countries, churning brown water moving too fast through places where people had once lived, trees bent in half, tents and tents and tents stretching into forever..."
And that's before we even get to the nihilistic criminal cult of King Death, which is rooted in the decay of our civilization and seems to want nothing but darkness and chaos, but also to be a symbol of it. While the climate change is human caused, the book seems to say, it is still assailing our civilization from outside - and we can, with concerted effort, repel it, plan, allocate, rebuild, confront it. But the enemy we can't defeat, because it is internal, is the human will to death, the selfishness, stuff-you-I'm-alright which is at its purest form in the crime syndicates and the gated communities of the rich, hoarding, thieving, fencing out, killing - a microcosm of what went wrong to cause the disaster in the first place, carrying on as normal, learning nothing.
This is a chilling vision of the future. And normally one might gain some relief from a horror story when the book closes and the bad things end, on closing this, my thoughts were rather that they might only be starting.
"Lost Girl" is the story of a missing child, and a father. As the world goes to hell, he focusses on his search for her. At any cost, whoever dies, whatever pain he has to suffer, he will find her.
Two years ago, Penny disappeared. She was playing in the garden by herself: her father, who should have been watching her, was upstairs, flirting by email. Is that why he is so driven to trace her, get her back? Is it guilt? Is it an attempt to atone, to flee from the empty life that's left after she was taken? Nevill doesn't quite tell us, preferring instead to communicate the simple fact of the father's drivenness, amplified by the fact that we never learn his name: throughout the book he remains, simply, the father.
This singleminded hunt is heightened because of the background to the novel. It is 2051, and runaway global warming has taken hold. The summers become hotter every year, crops are failing even in relatively buffered Britain, forest fires and droughts sweep the globe and India and Pakistan are on the verge of war over the declining rivers. A mass movement of refugees crosses Europe ("more and more coming in every day in great noisy leviathans of motion and colour and tired faces") and the population of the UK stands at 90 million (or 100, or 120... the Emergency Government isn't sure). Nationalists, jihadists and crime syndicates strut their stuff. Disease sweeps the globe (it's like the Four Horsemen have found a new partner,and enabler in climate change). Nobody has time or attention for one missing four year old. Except the father. Has he the right, we wonder, to pursue his own crusade like this? But if he doesn't who, who will?
It turns out that there are few like-minded souls who are happy to cooperate - or perhaps, one might think, use the father for their own ends, threatening sex offenders and imposing a kind of wild justice. It's a murky area and he'll take any help he can get - from the woman he only ever hears on the phone (except once...) and who he calls Scarlett Johansson, from the man who becomes Gene Hackman. They support the father, arm him and supply information - but can they really control what they've created?
Nevill's two most recent books, No One Gets Out Alive and House of Small Shadows have been unequivocal horror, albeit of a special kind: not so much spooks and spirits as the despair to be found in a dusty, abandoned country house or a rundown inner city terrace full of rustling plastic sheets and sticky, unwashed crockery. Here he maintains the emphasis on the seedy - as the world winds down, the father inhabits a string of decaying B&Bs, living off processed soya and Welsh rum. For normal people the world is going to rack and ruin. Only the super rich, or the criminal gangs, have any normality left. But the supernatural? The horror? Well, you'll have to decide, and you can call this a near future thriller or SF if you want, but for me, the horror (the horror!) is rather more stark because it is a credible portrait of what might actually happen, not a piece of fantasy. Perhaps we need more horror like this to shock us into action.
So while this book is not quite what I'd come to expect from Nevill, it is, I'd say, quite properly a horror story and the writing is superb (perhaps a little info-dumpy in places, maybe a few too many lists) but haunting, eloquent and deeply troubling: "...a never-ending carousel of flame, black smoke, glass-strewn streets, bodies under tarpaulins, riot shields glittering in sunlight, placards, aerial footage of felled buildings in other countries, churning brown water moving too fast through places where people had once lived, trees bent in half, tents and tents and tents stretching into forever..."
And that's before we even get to the nihilistic criminal cult of King Death, which is rooted in the decay of our civilization and seems to want nothing but darkness and chaos, but also to be a symbol of it. While the climate change is human caused, the book seems to say, it is still assailing our civilization from outside - and we can, with concerted effort, repel it, plan, allocate, rebuild, confront it. But the enemy we can't defeat, because it is internal, is the human will to death, the selfishness, stuff-you-I'm-alright which is at its purest form in the crime syndicates and the gated communities of the rich, hoarding, thieving, fencing out, killing - a microcosm of what went wrong to cause the disaster in the first place, carrying on as normal, learning nothing.
This is a chilling vision of the future. And normally one might gain some relief from a horror story when the book closes and the bad things end, on closing this, my thoughts were rather that they might only be starting.
December 4, 2015
When I first discovered Adam Nevill’s newest novel Lost Girl—many months before the book was released—I didn’t expect to exchange comments with Adam on Facebook about climate catastrophe, but what better way to start an intelligent conversation on such a fascinating subject than with someone who’d obviously done a vast amount of research on the topic, and that was well proven in the book.
The reality of exhaustible resources, water shortage and climate change causing future world strife is something I believe could happen, but what I found scary about Lost Girl was how masterfully and vivid Adam’s prose made those apocalyptic visions seem real. But beyond that setting, and what really brings to the stage a great novel, is the story Adam tells about a father losing his daughter in that dystopia; kidnapped off his front lawn. This protagonist-father not only lives in a ruined world, but inside he too is ruined and the only way to save his family is to find his daughter.
I have to admit, the first chapter of Lost Girl twisted my guts inside out. To have your daughter stolen out from under your nose from your home is an absolute nightmare. I have a four year old daughter� she’s asleep in her bed as I write this—and as I drifted along with the prose I felt the sting of loss and helplessness as the daughter was taken. Thus was born a Red Father, a brilliant label given to the protagonist-father later in the book that I felt referenced the mental state of a man-on-fire, and as I read and journeyed with this fellow father through the book I too became the Red Father. I felt the rage, the loss alongside the father, and yes, I too would do whatever was necessary to find my daughter alive. I was in the book, and the book was in me—and that’s how you write a 5 star novel.
Lost Girl is a heart pounding ride that weaves through the tapestry of a decaying world wrought with social chaos and pandemics. I truly felt like Adam had poured a part of himself into the writing, and perhaps that’s because I’d sensed his passion for the book in our earlier discussion on Facebook. Lost Girl not only creates a realistic vision of what a crumbling world could be, but it also pays off with all the thrills, chills and tension that will keep you turning the pages right to the end.
The reality of exhaustible resources, water shortage and climate change causing future world strife is something I believe could happen, but what I found scary about Lost Girl was how masterfully and vivid Adam’s prose made those apocalyptic visions seem real. But beyond that setting, and what really brings to the stage a great novel, is the story Adam tells about a father losing his daughter in that dystopia; kidnapped off his front lawn. This protagonist-father not only lives in a ruined world, but inside he too is ruined and the only way to save his family is to find his daughter.
I have to admit, the first chapter of Lost Girl twisted my guts inside out. To have your daughter stolen out from under your nose from your home is an absolute nightmare. I have a four year old daughter� she’s asleep in her bed as I write this—and as I drifted along with the prose I felt the sting of loss and helplessness as the daughter was taken. Thus was born a Red Father, a brilliant label given to the protagonist-father later in the book that I felt referenced the mental state of a man-on-fire, and as I read and journeyed with this fellow father through the book I too became the Red Father. I felt the rage, the loss alongside the father, and yes, I too would do whatever was necessary to find my daughter alive. I was in the book, and the book was in me—and that’s how you write a 5 star novel.
Lost Girl is a heart pounding ride that weaves through the tapestry of a decaying world wrought with social chaos and pandemics. I truly felt like Adam had poured a part of himself into the writing, and perhaps that’s because I’d sensed his passion for the book in our earlier discussion on Facebook. Lost Girl not only creates a realistic vision of what a crumbling world could be, but it also pays off with all the thrills, chills and tension that will keep you turning the pages right to the end.
August 7, 2023
10th October 2019
an apocalyptic vision of an all too possible 'future present': rich in credible detail and driven by a lot of [violent] action, albeit quite sentimental in passages concerning the central topic, but - apart from the grand chapel scene reminiscent of "Apartment 16" in its imagery - unfortunately lacking the admirable and unique core of Nevill's art: darkness_claustrophobia_weirdness_desperation_horror. but, of course, this is criticism dealing with a really well-written novel [3.5 stars].
7th August 2023
since having read "Lost Girl" i have been hoping that it's a real dystopia, i. e. a piece of literature set in the not-so-near future. i was wrong, alas. a real dystopia it has remained, but Adam Nevill's admirable clear-sightedness now bears a distinct trail of clairvoyance. but what did i expect? he's a writer of horror, after all. and a real fine one at that. bowing my head while raising my horns towards the far too many orcs that seem to have mixed with far too large a part of mankind.
an apocalyptic vision of an all too possible 'future present': rich in credible detail and driven by a lot of [violent] action, albeit quite sentimental in passages concerning the central topic, but - apart from the grand chapel scene reminiscent of "Apartment 16" in its imagery - unfortunately lacking the admirable and unique core of Nevill's art: darkness_claustrophobia_weirdness_desperation_horror. but, of course, this is criticism dealing with a really well-written novel [3.5 stars].
7th August 2023
since having read "Lost Girl" i have been hoping that it's a real dystopia, i. e. a piece of literature set in the not-so-near future. i was wrong, alas. a real dystopia it has remained, but Adam Nevill's admirable clear-sightedness now bears a distinct trail of clairvoyance. but what did i expect? he's a writer of horror, after all. and a real fine one at that. bowing my head while raising my horns towards the far too many orcs that seem to have mixed with far too large a part of mankind.
June 5, 2021
Made my through this quickly. Very good book, excellently paced. Enjoyed the fairy tales allusions (ogres in caves, dark wizards, etc) and the truly dreadful world this story is set in - one that's all the better experienced during the 2018 Summer heatwave in Europe... or not.
I very much hope Adam Nevill launch pads into a sequel, or sequels, set in this fictional pre-apocalyptic Britain. Could prove instructive.
I very much hope Adam Nevill launch pads into a sequel, or sequels, set in this fictional pre-apocalyptic Britain. Could prove instructive.
October 22, 2015
(cross posted from )
There is terror all around us, and Adam Nevill never lets us forget it. I was more than excited to receive an ARC of his newest book, Lost Girl, from the publisher but it was nothing like I expected it to be. If you’ve ever read any of Nevill’s other work, you’re going to be very surprised with this particular novel, because it’s very different than anything he’s ever written.
While the father is in his house on the Internet, his daughter is taken from him. One minute she was playing in the garden and then next she is gone. Every parent has nightmares about this scenario and Nevill has pulled right from our night terrors and put our thoughts into print. The police search for a time but are unable to find any leads. Does anyone except for the father and his wife care? It doesn’t seem like anyone is willing to do anything. He needs to know where his daughter has gone. The responsibility of his little girl’s life weighs on him heavily and drives him to hunt for her.
With the help of his mysteriously anonymous contacts (one of which the father names Scarlett Johansson) he is playing a game with his life. Each lead he uncovers brings him down a path, closer and closer to uncovering a secret. The shady characters of a child selling crime syndicate are brought to light and justice under his watch. Gangs control the world. Sickness and plague accompany drought and everyone in the world is desperate to exist. Nothing could ever prepare the father for the truth that exists at the end of this story though. Sometimes there is more darkness in people then we realize. Our past can resurface when we least expect it to, and when we’re face to face with someone that we once trusted, all we’re able to find are the holes that they left inside ourselves.
We never learn the father’s name or where he came from. Only that his love for his child and her well being are constantly his focus as he transforms himself from the father to Red Father. During his evolution, he becomes like the people he is hunting. He feels the blackness entering his soul and his determination to save his little girl is the only thing that keeps his mind straight. The the very real possibility that we could one day be in a place where we are forced to make the same decisions is horrific. The picture of the future that Nevill paints completely blurs the line between fiction and non-fiction.
In the other Nevill books that I’ve read, the horror is contained in a specific place. With Lost Girl, the entire world is the horror. Desperate people become evil when disease and cures come into play. They turn to the powerful, who happen to be involved in gangs and crime syndicates. One of the most terrifying possibilities that this book presents us with is that this could very well be our future. It is most certainly a possiblity that we could end up in the shoes of Red Father.
But when we search our souls, would we go as far as he is willing to, surrounding ourselves with depression, death and pain?
Does the father become who he was destined to be and uncover more mystery than he bargained for?
Invest your time in reading Lost Girl to find out. The unique story will make you cringe and force you to think about the people that you once surrounded yourself with.
There is terror all around us, and Adam Nevill never lets us forget it. I was more than excited to receive an ARC of his newest book, Lost Girl, from the publisher but it was nothing like I expected it to be. If you’ve ever read any of Nevill’s other work, you’re going to be very surprised with this particular novel, because it’s very different than anything he’s ever written.
While the father is in his house on the Internet, his daughter is taken from him. One minute she was playing in the garden and then next she is gone. Every parent has nightmares about this scenario and Nevill has pulled right from our night terrors and put our thoughts into print. The police search for a time but are unable to find any leads. Does anyone except for the father and his wife care? It doesn’t seem like anyone is willing to do anything. He needs to know where his daughter has gone. The responsibility of his little girl’s life weighs on him heavily and drives him to hunt for her.
With the help of his mysteriously anonymous contacts (one of which the father names Scarlett Johansson) he is playing a game with his life. Each lead he uncovers brings him down a path, closer and closer to uncovering a secret. The shady characters of a child selling crime syndicate are brought to light and justice under his watch. Gangs control the world. Sickness and plague accompany drought and everyone in the world is desperate to exist. Nothing could ever prepare the father for the truth that exists at the end of this story though. Sometimes there is more darkness in people then we realize. Our past can resurface when we least expect it to, and when we’re face to face with someone that we once trusted, all we’re able to find are the holes that they left inside ourselves.
We never learn the father’s name or where he came from. Only that his love for his child and her well being are constantly his focus as he transforms himself from the father to Red Father. During his evolution, he becomes like the people he is hunting. He feels the blackness entering his soul and his determination to save his little girl is the only thing that keeps his mind straight. The the very real possibility that we could one day be in a place where we are forced to make the same decisions is horrific. The picture of the future that Nevill paints completely blurs the line between fiction and non-fiction.
In the other Nevill books that I’ve read, the horror is contained in a specific place. With Lost Girl, the entire world is the horror. Desperate people become evil when disease and cures come into play. They turn to the powerful, who happen to be involved in gangs and crime syndicates. One of the most terrifying possibilities that this book presents us with is that this could very well be our future. It is most certainly a possiblity that we could end up in the shoes of Red Father.
But when we search our souls, would we go as far as he is willing to, surrounding ourselves with depression, death and pain?
Does the father become who he was destined to be and uncover more mystery than he bargained for?
Invest your time in reading Lost Girl to find out. The unique story will make you cringe and force you to think about the people that you once surrounded yourself with.
June 21, 2016
My original audiobook review and many others can be found at .
It is the year 2053, climate change is wreaking havoc on the world: floods, droughts, starvation, disease, and mass migration north. The Father (we never learn his name) is living a semi-normal life in his upper middle class neighborhood in England with his wife and daughter when tragedy strikes. His four year-old daughter is abducted. The police are overwhelmed with hundreds of more serious crimes and do little to help. Driven somewhat insane with the loss and spiraling thoughts of what kind of depraved monster has taken his daughter, the Father takes matters into his own hands.
The story begins two years after the daughter’s abduction. The Father is working as a kind of free-lance interrogator with the secret help of sympathetic police officers. He crosses line after line of illegal behavior as he tortures, then kills his leads � child molesters and human traffickers. There seems to be no limit to the depravity of the men he finds. It is difficult for him to unsee their evil.
It is a dark world, spiraling quickly to a deadly end for all humanity. The backdrop of climate change and human misery keeps the mood bleak and the listener in a state of perpetual hopelessness, mirroring the Father’s own state. This well written jewel tends to dig deeply into metaphor, describing mood and events with great detail. While the story is full of action, violence and drama, it can also move slowly, methodically at times over sensations and detail. It is well worth the effort, just an observations for some impatient listeners, stay with it.
Without spoiling the plot, it is worth noting a particular character that is introduced late in the novel. This drug addled acolyte is so compelling and unusual, the listener will wish he had been brought into the story earlier. Reality itself bends around this strange person, inviting the listener to think differently about metaphysics, humanity and most interestingly � death.
The audiobook is performed by Kris Dyer, who is simply outstanding. The character voices are clearly differentiated and remarkable for their variety. Most notable are his female voices, which at times make the listener wonder if there wasn’t a second narrator. Mr. Dyer matches the dark mood of the novel in voice and inflection giving what can only be described as a near perfect performance. His is a voice worth following.
This is an outstanding novel performed exceptionally well. Its violent theme and dark mood will not appeal to every listener, however. It is about a vigilante father trying to recover his daughter or at the very least punish those who would have abused her. The attention to detail and the dire warning given in this dark novel make it well worth listening to. Highly recommended.
Warning: Scenes of extreme violence, torture and child abuse make this novel inappropriate for young listeners and others sensitive to these themes.
Audiobook was provided for review by the publisher.
It is the year 2053, climate change is wreaking havoc on the world: floods, droughts, starvation, disease, and mass migration north. The Father (we never learn his name) is living a semi-normal life in his upper middle class neighborhood in England with his wife and daughter when tragedy strikes. His four year-old daughter is abducted. The police are overwhelmed with hundreds of more serious crimes and do little to help. Driven somewhat insane with the loss and spiraling thoughts of what kind of depraved monster has taken his daughter, the Father takes matters into his own hands.
The story begins two years after the daughter’s abduction. The Father is working as a kind of free-lance interrogator with the secret help of sympathetic police officers. He crosses line after line of illegal behavior as he tortures, then kills his leads � child molesters and human traffickers. There seems to be no limit to the depravity of the men he finds. It is difficult for him to unsee their evil.
It is a dark world, spiraling quickly to a deadly end for all humanity. The backdrop of climate change and human misery keeps the mood bleak and the listener in a state of perpetual hopelessness, mirroring the Father’s own state. This well written jewel tends to dig deeply into metaphor, describing mood and events with great detail. While the story is full of action, violence and drama, it can also move slowly, methodically at times over sensations and detail. It is well worth the effort, just an observations for some impatient listeners, stay with it.
Without spoiling the plot, it is worth noting a particular character that is introduced late in the novel. This drug addled acolyte is so compelling and unusual, the listener will wish he had been brought into the story earlier. Reality itself bends around this strange person, inviting the listener to think differently about metaphysics, humanity and most interestingly � death.
The audiobook is performed by Kris Dyer, who is simply outstanding. The character voices are clearly differentiated and remarkable for their variety. Most notable are his female voices, which at times make the listener wonder if there wasn’t a second narrator. Mr. Dyer matches the dark mood of the novel in voice and inflection giving what can only be described as a near perfect performance. His is a voice worth following.
This is an outstanding novel performed exceptionally well. Its violent theme and dark mood will not appeal to every listener, however. It is about a vigilante father trying to recover his daughter or at the very least punish those who would have abused her. The attention to detail and the dire warning given in this dark novel make it well worth listening to. Highly recommended.
Warning: Scenes of extreme violence, torture and child abuse make this novel inappropriate for young listeners and others sensitive to these themes.
Audiobook was provided for review by the publisher.
September 16, 2018
At the end of the day, this could have simply been a well written, deeply affecting book about a father's hunt for his kidnapped daughter. And I would have rated it just as high I think. What Adam Nevill does though is raise every possible stake. He takes the basic premise and puts it in a near future where all of our most pessimistic (but still realistic) predictions about the state of the world have slowly but surely materialized. It is so brutal and what is already a dread filled situation is only made so much harder to take. This book is an experience. One I recommend highly without being able to say it will be enjoyable.
November 16, 2015
It’s not the fictional aspects of Lost Girl which will keep you wide awake at night, enduring endless dark hours between sweat-soaked fever dreams. It’s the entirely possible predictions of what might happen in the next 40 years that should snap you out of complacent daydreams. Forest fires blazing out of control across whole continents. SARS killing by the million. Entire countries flooded. The end of the world as we know it? Oh yes.
The author deserves massive credit for his masterful manipulation of solid scientific information, from which he weaves together an entirely plausible set of doomsday scenarios. Almost any of them alone could be catastrophic: the combination of climate change, pandemic, and uncontrolled mass migration which are portrayed in Lost Girl inevitably tips human society over the edge.
A less accomplished author might’ve struggled to deliver the relentless torrent of information and keep things interesting. Adam Nevill neither glosses over the detail nor does he deluge the reader in tedious technobabble. The hardcore science stuff provides a superb, solid foundation for Nevill to build an atmospheric edifice of accumulating evil. It’s never completely unequivocal � but the rising sense of sinister menace more than hints at something Very Bad, waiting to exploit the collapse of mankind’s moral fibre.
Then there’s the plot. Aggrieved father turns vigilante as society crumbles, attempting to find his little girl who was kidnapped two years ago. Ventures into the lion’s den of paedophiles, pushers and priests of the apocalypse. Actually, this was my least favourite part of the book. Didn’t empathise with the protagonist; resented his dazzling self-obsessed guilt-trip and staggering practical incompetence.
The writing is idiosyncratic, almost gothic in its traditional construction and metered obscurity. The narrative feels like it's been sculpted; the words hewn from a solid mass of inky blackness to create towering descriptive passages of massive intensity.
The publishers and most other readers classify this book as ‘horror�, and indeed it reveals an entirely horrific possible future. But it’s not especially supernatural, nor so graphically explicit that I would’ve automatically stacked it alongside slashers, blood noir and spooky schtick.
Lost Girl holds up an unflinching mirror to our reality, and it’s not a pretty sight. It does, however, also hold out a thin hope for humanity � and after reading this, you’ll probably feel that we need one.
8/10
There's a more detailed review over at
The author deserves massive credit for his masterful manipulation of solid scientific information, from which he weaves together an entirely plausible set of doomsday scenarios. Almost any of them alone could be catastrophic: the combination of climate change, pandemic, and uncontrolled mass migration which are portrayed in Lost Girl inevitably tips human society over the edge.
A less accomplished author might’ve struggled to deliver the relentless torrent of information and keep things interesting. Adam Nevill neither glosses over the detail nor does he deluge the reader in tedious technobabble. The hardcore science stuff provides a superb, solid foundation for Nevill to build an atmospheric edifice of accumulating evil. It’s never completely unequivocal � but the rising sense of sinister menace more than hints at something Very Bad, waiting to exploit the collapse of mankind’s moral fibre.
Then there’s the plot. Aggrieved father turns vigilante as society crumbles, attempting to find his little girl who was kidnapped two years ago. Ventures into the lion’s den of paedophiles, pushers and priests of the apocalypse. Actually, this was my least favourite part of the book. Didn’t empathise with the protagonist; resented his dazzling self-obsessed guilt-trip and staggering practical incompetence.
The writing is idiosyncratic, almost gothic in its traditional construction and metered obscurity. The narrative feels like it's been sculpted; the words hewn from a solid mass of inky blackness to create towering descriptive passages of massive intensity.
The publishers and most other readers classify this book as ‘horror�, and indeed it reveals an entirely horrific possible future. But it’s not especially supernatural, nor so graphically explicit that I would’ve automatically stacked it alongside slashers, blood noir and spooky schtick.
Lost Girl holds up an unflinching mirror to our reality, and it’s not a pretty sight. It does, however, also hold out a thin hope for humanity � and after reading this, you’ll probably feel that we need one.
8/10
There's a more detailed review over at
May 10, 2017
I really wanted to give this book five stars because, honestly, there's very few authors that seem to write with as much attention to detail, with so much description, and with so much uniqueness as Adam Nevill. That, and the fact that he managed to give me the heeby-jeebies in both The Ritual and No One Gets Out Alive (a feat that hasn't been accomplished since Blatey's The Exorcist).
However, The Lost Girl, was, unfortunately, neither scary, nor really all that original. Yes, it was dark, bleak, and brutal as hell, all things which I absolutely love in a good novel, and there were moments that were super entertaining and insanely vivid in their depiction of violence but at the end of the day it just failed to really strike me or draw me in as much I would have expected coming from this author.
I think the problem with The Lost Girl comes at the cost of its plot. It's not really a true "horror" novel and it's not really a true "hard-boiled detective" novel either. Nor is it a good example of a post-apocalyptic world or story. Nevill, who's real talent comes in scaring the hell out of his readers with some pretty freaky paranormal and spooky settings, seems to be out of his comfort zone here. While I applaud his attempt to try something new, and still think at face value The Lost Girl is a well written novel, it just felt like the author was trying to do too many things at once, trying to write an entirely different genre but still unwilling to let go of elements of others.
Like I said though, The Lost Girl isn't a bad book, and had any other author written it (I'm thinking Nick Cutter or Joe Hill), I would have easily given the thing 5 stars. It's just that Nevill is a much better author than this example would have you believe.
However, The Lost Girl, was, unfortunately, neither scary, nor really all that original. Yes, it was dark, bleak, and brutal as hell, all things which I absolutely love in a good novel, and there were moments that were super entertaining and insanely vivid in their depiction of violence but at the end of the day it just failed to really strike me or draw me in as much I would have expected coming from this author.
I think the problem with The Lost Girl comes at the cost of its plot. It's not really a true "horror" novel and it's not really a true "hard-boiled detective" novel either. Nor is it a good example of a post-apocalyptic world or story. Nevill, who's real talent comes in scaring the hell out of his readers with some pretty freaky paranormal and spooky settings, seems to be out of his comfort zone here. While I applaud his attempt to try something new, and still think at face value The Lost Girl is a well written novel, it just felt like the author was trying to do too many things at once, trying to write an entirely different genre but still unwilling to let go of elements of others.
Like I said though, The Lost Girl isn't a bad book, and had any other author written it (I'm thinking Nick Cutter or Joe Hill), I would have easily given the thing 5 stars. It's just that Nevill is a much better author than this example would have you believe.
June 24, 2018
Synopsis:
Set in the near future (2053) in a world ravished by climate change and civilization is on the brink of collapse, a father sets on a dark and dangerous journey to try to find his abducted daughter.
The story is gripping, menacing, ghastly and tightly woven from the very beginning. Many aspects of the stories are very dark and at times hard to stomach, as it deals with human cruelty, destruction of the planet, suffering, but especially topics of kidnapping, child sex trafficking, but Adam Nevill weaves all these together expertly and keeps your engaged and invested in the story from page 1, all thanks to his exceptional writing.
Now, the writing--this, in my opinion, is the true star of the book--it is extraordinary! His vocabulary is vast and his descriptions are vivid, precise, fluid, and imaginative. Not only do you see what the protagonist sees, you smell what he smells, you hear what he hears, and you feel what he feels--both emotionally and physically. The scenes are so vivid it's almost like watching a movie! I'm deeply impressed by Adam Nevill's writing and I think he is a true literary master!
I highly recommend this book just by its writing alone, and I'll definitely read more of Adam Nevill's works!
Set in the near future (2053) in a world ravished by climate change and civilization is on the brink of collapse, a father sets on a dark and dangerous journey to try to find his abducted daughter.
The story is gripping, menacing, ghastly and tightly woven from the very beginning. Many aspects of the stories are very dark and at times hard to stomach, as it deals with human cruelty, destruction of the planet, suffering, but especially topics of kidnapping, child sex trafficking, but Adam Nevill weaves all these together expertly and keeps your engaged and invested in the story from page 1, all thanks to his exceptional writing.
Now, the writing--this, in my opinion, is the true star of the book--it is extraordinary! His vocabulary is vast and his descriptions are vivid, precise, fluid, and imaginative. Not only do you see what the protagonist sees, you smell what he smells, you hear what he hears, and you feel what he feels--both emotionally and physically. The scenes are so vivid it's almost like watching a movie! I'm deeply impressed by Adam Nevill's writing and I think he is a true literary master!
I highly recommend this book just by its writing alone, and I'll definitely read more of Adam Nevill's works!
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