Without warning, a horde of naked, bloodthirsty lunatics descends on the Pine Village Apartment Complex, slaughtering everyone in their path. Eleven wildly different residents (a trans woman, a suicidal writer, a Vietnam vet, a newlywed couple, a single mother and her son, two small-time criminals, and a serial killer) have to band together to survive the night. What follows is a relentless, action-packed fight for survival.
Publishing year:Â 2016
Page count:Â 232
The Reading Experience
This book grabs you by the throat a few pages in and doesn’t let go. I barely had time to settle into my reading spot before everything went completely off the rails. My first thought was honestly just, ‘What did I miss?’ As it turns out, nothing. Keene doesn’t waste any time, and I respect that.
The pace is relentless. If you like fast-paced horror with no let-up, this one delivers. Keene’s writing is direct: there are no frills, no unnecessary prose and nothing to get in the way of the carnage. His style is fluid and uncomplicated, meaning you tear through the pages without ever feeling like you are wading through filler.
The atmosphere is dark and suffocating in the best way. The idea of this actually happening is enough to make your hair stand on end. You can feel the fear oozing off the characters, and I caught myself thinking, “What would I do in this situation?” more than once. The answer I kept coming back to was to run as fast and as far as possible, but given the shape I’m in, that probably wouldn’t end well.
I was pleasantly surprised by the characters. For a book this short and this violent, the cast is surprisingly diverse, and their backstories gradually unfold as the chaos escalates. These are normal people: flawed, messy, sometimes frustrating. That makes them feel real. I have to say, I did like some of them. Others, not so much. But I cared enough to want them to make it, and that’s more than I can say for a lot of horror novels.
The story had me hooked right until the very end. And then it was all over. I don’t want to give away any spoilers, but the ending left me with so many unanswered questions and felt way too sudden. I actually went back to check if I’d missed something important. I hadn’t. That made things a bit less exciting and took away some of the fun at the end. It’s a real shame because the rest of the ride was so good.
Summary
The Complex is a fast, brutal, and surprisingly character-driven siege horror that gets straight to the good stuff. Keene’s writing is simple and the pace is fast-paced, making it an easy and entertaining read. The ending is a bit of a let-down, to be honest, and that’s what’s stopping it from being great. But if you’re after a piece of pure, adrenaline-fueled entertainment, it does the job. This was my first Brian Keene book, and I’ll definitely be reading more of them.
Read it if: You want fast-paced, no-nonsense horror that grabs you immediately and does not let go.
Skip it if: You need a satisfying, well-wrapped-up ending to feel like your time was well spent.
Content Warning
- Extreme graphic violence and gore
- Torture
- Suicidal ideation
- Nudity
- Fat-shaming
If you enjoyed this review, you might also want to check out my thoughts on Fever House, another character-driven horror with an ensemble cast that doesn’t pull its punches.
And if morally complex characters thrown into impossible situations are your thing, King Sorrow takes that idea and runs with it on an epic, unforgettable scale.
