The Ritual by Adam L.G. Nevill (Author of The Reddening) is one helluva page turner. The book was published in 2011 and made into a movie in 2017. In truth, I am hard-pressed to think of any other books I've read that deserved a film adaptation more. I say this having read Terminator, The Godfather, and The Exorcist; all of which were incredible cinematic achievements in addition to being excellent and engaging reads.
Four friends have gotten together for a hike in Sweden. They were best friends in college, fifteen years prior. Now, two of them are seemingly successful financially, yet utterly unprepared for the brutal outdoors. All of which would make for an excellent read alone, as Jack London would have done, yet the group stumbles across a mutilated corpse hanging from a tree four hours into a shortcut chosen to save the disastrous trip. The terror mounts as the friends take shelter in an ancient hovel adorned with skulls and hand-crafted crucifixes. The trips grows steadily worse as the group is hunted in what could very well be Europe's last virgin forest.
The first thing I noticed when I delved into The Ritual was the pace. The author did a very clever thing by using lots of very short chapters with cliffhangers at the end of all of them. This drew me in and hooked me, and also drove the story along at a rapid clip. Within the first 100 pages I was astounded at how much had happened and how well I felt that I knew the characters.
The gore was very visceral and shocking, calling the images directly to the mind's eye. The astounding part of this, of course, was the detachment of the author. The blood and bone and organs were simply there, and the effect was excellent.
Part 2 of the book, named "South of Heaven" (I feel certain that this is a Slayer reference, which pleases me to no end), took a strange turn that almost lost me… until the author drew me back in with expert continuity. I won't delve into it, because spoilers are the enemy, but if you give this masterpiece a read and hit this section and consider stepping away, I implore you to stick with it. It all comes around.
Masterful work, The Ritual. Every star, Every thumb up. Dismembered and hung from the ceiling, in fact. Thank you, Mr. Nevill. This was a treat. A veritable feast of treats.
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