The Apartment is a psychological thriller that keeps you guessing throughout .So well written I found this book very hard to put down . Freya and her daughter Skye are given the opportunity to move into a luxurious apartment in Kensington at a rent she can afford she thinks her luck has changed at last but soon strange things start to happen that begin to frighten her .The story is creepy and atmospheric I loved it and didn't guess the ending .Many thanks to the Publisher the Author and NetGalley for my copy in return for an honest review .

Freya and her daughter Skye desperately need somewhere new to restart after the death of her husband. A chance encounter in a cafe with Dr.Marsden leads Freya to renting in a posh apartment block. Dr. Marsden is very keen for Freya to stay, so much so that he offers her the apartment at whatever she can afford. But when Freya and Skye start hearing noises and strange things start happening in the apartment, Freya begins to wonder if it was a bad idea to come live at Adder House 🤔

2⭐- Oh dear, I'm afraid this book really didn't do it for me😬 The language was so overly formal in places that it stilted the flow of the story. And unfortunately the story itself was pretty weak. It felt like it was a half baked idea that was thrown together for the sake of it. I wouldn't recommend this read. 🙁

A wonderful, creepy read. I love the slow build-up of suspense, the beautiful but spooky house and its weird residents. It was easy to see how Freya got drawn into living there and her fear and suspicion were brilliantly portrayed. The sections from the 1920s psychological experiments are chilling. If you read a lot of psychological suspense you'll probably guess where the story's going and who's responsible but I still really enjoyed reading it and would recommend it to anyone who loves domestic noir

I loved this book thank you so much to netgalley for letting me read it.
I was hooked from the very Start as it moves at a quick pace which was really good and very enjoyable and keeps you wanting to know more.

Freya lives with her daughter skye and has had a tough life she was put into care as a young child and never really had any family. But she gets married and has skye but 18 months later that all changes and her husband moves out and then he dies.
So at the start of the book freya and skye are looking to sell there house and start a fresh somewhere new except she does not have a huge amount of money and starts to worry were they will be able to afford but after a chance meeting or is it?, with a Dr Marsden who offers her the chance of an amazing apartment in a fantastic part of town with a very small rent seems too good to be true.

After they move in things start being moved around the apartment and they hear very strange noises should they be worried especially when they hear stories of a young woman who lived here with her daughter but died.

Truly gripping read.
Would highly recommend.

I really enjoyed The Apartment. I flew through it - it grabbed my attention and I was immediately invested in Freya and Skye. I wanted the best for Skye, also!! The Adder House is super creepy, the people who live there are even creepier, and you're always wondering what their ulterior motives are. I was fascinated by the fact that it is based on an actual psychological study: the Little Albert experiment. I researched the study after the book. Slater does a great job of staying true to the experiment. I actually felt more educated after reading this one!

I received this ARC through Net Galley. I enjoyed the book but had the plot figured out fairly early on. Also, I think there were plenty of red flags which made it frustrating that the mother didn't act on her instincts sooner.

This is the story of a young mother Freya and her 5 year old daughter Skye whose husband has died, and is in dire need. Freya meets Dr Marsden in a cafe who offers her a small apartment in a nice neighborhood for a great rent. Freya and Skye move in and then things happen...

EXCERPT: 'You said you're living on Palace Gate. Is the building called Adder House?'

'That's right.' I swallow hard. 'I live in a small top floor apartment with my daughter, Skye.'

'Oh God.' Linda's hand flies to her mouth and she squeezes her eyes shut as if she can't bear the pictures that are flooding in. 'This is important, Freya. How did you find out about it, the apartment? How did you know it was up for rent'

'It was totally by chance. I was in -'

'A coffee shop? And Marsden happened to sit at your table by chance? Showed you his rental fliers? Asked if you wanted to view the apartment, despite it being something you could never afford to rent in a million years?'

'Something like that, yes.' I swallow again, wiping my damp palms on my jeans.

'That's exactly what happened to Sophie, and I can assure you that chance had nothing to do with it. Every single word he uttered to you was planned.'

ABOUT THIS BOOK: Freya Miller needs a miracle. In the fallout of her husband’s betrayal, she’s about to lose her family home, and with it the security she craves for her five-year-old daughter, Skye. Adrift and alone, she’s on the verge of despair until a chance meeting with the charismatic Dr Marsden changes everything. He’s seeking a new tenant for a shockingly affordable flat in a fashionable area of London.

Adder House sounds too good to be true… But Freya really can’t afford to be cynical, and Dr Marsden is adamant she and Skye will be a perfect fit with the other residents.

But Adder House has secrets. Even behind a locked front door, Freya feels as if she’s being watched: objects moving, unfamiliar smells, the blinking light of a concealed camera… and it’s not long before she begins to suspect that her dream home is hiding a nightmarish reality. Was it really chance that led her here—or something unthinkably dark?

As the truth about Adder House starts to unravel, can Freya and Skye get out—or will they be locked in forever?

MY THOUGHTS: We all know that saying about not looking the gift horse in the mouth, but it seems that sometimes we should. But when you're desperate...

Even the name, Adder House, gives me the creeps. Although the apartment house sounds absolutely beautiful, who would want to live in a building named for a snake?

But beautiful as it is, sumptuous, luxurious, it has a past, one that the enigmatic pair of Doctor and Audrey Marsden are unwilling to reveal. Instead they smooth away all obstacles and shower Freya and Skye with generous gifts. What is that other saying, the one about beware of Romans bearing gifts? But when you're desperate...

Only four of the six apartments are currently occupied. Professor and Susan Woodward are tenants of one. He seems nervous, she frail and depressed after a series of miscarriages. The only person who appears remotely normal in the building is the elderly Lily Brockley who takes Freya and Skye under her wing, warning her to 'be careful' of the other tenants without quite explaining why.

I read this book in one sitting. Yes, there are some holes in the plot, and I have not entirely bought into the ending, but Slater kept me entertained and guessing the whole way through. And that, to me, is worth 4 stars.

What next Ms Slater?

😍🙂🤔🤨

'I do like to surround myself with beautiful things. There's so much ugliness in the world . . . so much distrust and focus on negative events, rather than on making peaceful progress so that the world is a better, more informed place for our future generations.'

#TheApartment #NetGalley

The Apartment is due for publication 28 April 2020.

THE AUTHOR: For many years, Kim sent her work out to literary agents and collected an impressive stack of rejection slips. At the age of 40 she went back to Nottingham Trent University and now has an MA in Creative Writing.

Before graduating in 2012, she gained literary agent representation and a book deal. As Kim says, ‘it was a fairytale … at the end of a very long road!’

Kim is a full-time writer and lives in Nottinghamshire with her husband.

DISCLOSURE: Thank you to Amazon Publishing UK via Netgalley for providing a digital ARC of The Apartment by K.L. Slater for review. All opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own personal opinions.

For an explanation of my rating system please refer to my Goodreads.com profile page or the about page on sandysbookaday.wordpress.com

This review is also published on Twitter, Amazon, Instagram and my webpage.

Love KL slaters books they always keep me hooked and this one was no different! Couldn’t recommend enough definitely a page turner!

This is my first K.L Slater read and I had seen a few people talking about this book so I was very keen to read this.

It follows Freya Miller and her young daughter Skye. Freya’s husband is no longer around and she is losing her family home and needs to find somewhere to live without paying a sky high rent. It soon comes about that she moves into a stylish apartment that she is offered to rent for hardly any money in a posh area of London by a Doctor she bumps into one day.

Once Freya and Skye move in, weird things start happening like hearing strange noises, furniture being moved around overnight and an eerie feeling of being watched. Their dream home soon turns into a nightmare.

This was just an ok read for me. I enjoyed it enough but I just found Freya really frustrating. She seemed too naive and I felt myself getting really wound up with her. Also lets be honest, if you were offered to rent an upmarket apartment by a stranger you bump into one day surely you would be a bit wary. Especially when they say to you that they think you look like the perfect person to live there and you wont have to pay much rent even if its in a fashionable area of London where the rent is sky high. This would surely ring alarm bells and seem too good to be true. I do get that Freya was in a desperate situation but even so her reaction to a few things in the book just annoyed me!

It is a bit of a creepy read with a lot of very odd characters and a clever plot but I had worked out what was going on very early on in the book. I did enjoy the relationship between Freya and Skye and the author kept me interested in the story enough but I just felt like it was quite slow going and I had a lot of unanswered questions by the end. I am sure other readers will like this but it was a bit disappointing for me.

Thank you to Netgalley and Amazon Publishing UK for the ARC. This is published on the 28th April.

Full of red flags and red herrings! A too good to be true offer for a single mam turns out to be just that. I was hooked from the opening, and didn't see the ending coming, I was suspicious of everyone! Really enjoyed this.

I finished this book last night and my initial thought was 'Is that it?' Too many things were left unresolved and I think I was expecting a lot more from it.

It was a bit creepy but it lacked real tension and I spent most of the book waiting for something to happen.

I have read and enjoyed several books by K L Slater but I am sorry to say I don't think is up to her usual standard.

This was almost a five. The ending, while not being terrible, brought it down a tiny bit. The entire book had a throwback feel. So many stories of weird groups of old people and creepy houses from the 60s, 70s, and 80s kept coming to mind. Some resemblance to Lock Every Door in there, as well.

Freya and her daughter have had it rough. Her husband left for her best friend and then died suddenly. She is desperate for a place to live when it becomes apparent she will have to sell the house they once shared. Adder House just falls into her lap. Too good to be true...

The residence, the few she even sees, go from sweet to sinister gradually. The pacing is good, though, so this can be read in one good day. The tension is enough to keep it going until the end.

The end. Would have probably been better without my psychology degree. It was just a little ridiculous. Of course, there were some horrendous studies done in the past in the name of psychology. But the reasoning behind it all was just a little bit silly to me.

Before I started to read the book and got into the story I feared this book may be another one about a woman in her thirties who gradually loses grasp of things and panics more and more.
There are some similarities to my comment but I felt she never really lost the plot. It is very well written and is very well paced. There are twists and unexpected bits and you are never quite sure who is responsible. A very clever ending as the real culprit is revealed even though because of the flashbacks to the 1920s you have some idea what it is all about. A very enjoyable book and well worth reading

I really like K.L. Slater and enjoy her writing. The Apartment was no exception! I was able to plow through this book really quickly due to the way she makes her words flow.
Unfortunately, there were no surprises here for me as I guessed the ending from really early on. I was hoping I would be wrong.
I did like the ending with its neat and tidy bow. All of the loose ends were tied up and explained well.
I will definitely continue to read Slater’s books.

Thanks so much to Amazon Publishing UK and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for my honest review!

I thought this book started out a little strange. Freya’s husband left her and their little girl for another woman, and then he died. This forced Freya into having to sell her house, and find a new place for her and her daughter to live. Freya was in a coffee house looking on the board to see if there was any place for rent, when a man comes over to her acting like he is going to put up a flyer for a place to rent. Interesting coincidence. Freya gets hooked in by the prospect of a place to rent that is within her budget. She thought that the way the rent was negotiated was strange, and after she sees the house where they will be living it even seems stranger to her. The landlords are awfully strange. Freya and Skye don’t particularly like them. The other residents in this house are a little strange as well. Her landlords try to push their decisions onto Freya. I thought it was rather interesting that the story follows a famous psychological behavioral experiment. I thought that Freya needed to speak up for herself instead of letting her landlords walk over the top of her. Freya seemed to be a bit ditzy and paranoid. Toward the end of the book, Freya starts to doubt herself. Instead of thinking about what to do, she freak’s out and almost hurts herself.

I received an ARC of The Apartment by K.L. Slater from NetGalley.
This is a mystery that revolves around a prestigious apartment. A woman, recently widowed, and her 5 year-old daughter, facing financial difficulties, are miraculously invited to move into a tony apartment building by a kind old doctor. They are welcomed with open arms and the rent is incredibly low.
Strange things begin happening. But there is not much of a plot to this book. And there are not many characters. And we don't get to know them too well.
What the author does well in this book is ..... build suspense!
The book is comprised of many short chapters and is a fast read. Every chapter seems to add just one more element of suspense.
The ending was less dramatic than I hoped. But it was an enjoyable read.

From beginning to end, this psychological thriller keeps the reader on the edge of their seat! What's going on at the Adder House? Nothing good, that's for sure. An outstanding read!

For much of this book, I couldn't tell what big reveal the author was leading the reader to. Sometimes that can be off-putting, but I really enjoyed it this time. The plot if this book summed up in one sentence- If something is too good to be true, it probably is. I don't know how I felt about using humans in a real world science/psychology experiment, but the way the author wrote was just so intriguing that I had a hard time putting this one down. 4/5 stars, easily.

This book was surprisingly short and the good thing about that is that you can definitely finish it in a day or two since it is a page-turner. If you want to be creeped out for a night then this could be the book for you.

Unfortunately I felt it too short to really develop the characters completely. Also, the ending seemed very abrupt and I was left with many questions. Although explained at the end, the few journal entries from the past were introduced in a confusing way. The idea is definitely there, I just wish it was explored and thought out a little bit more.

Thank you Netgalley, Amazon Publishing UK, and K.L. Slater for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!