The Residency

De: Kayla Frederick

Narrado por: Freya Victoria

8 artists.
1 art residency.
1 chance to leave alive.

Art is pain. Or so they say.

As a struggling artist in New York City, Ira is desperate to get her shot at the big time. When an invitation to a week long art residency on a private island in the Bahamas drops in her inbox, she leaps at the chance.

But something is off about Turquoise Bay and its owner, The Curator.

When Ira and seven other artists end up locked in an underground bunker, the only way out is to play the Curator's games.

Will they survive?

Or will they die for their art?

©2024 Kayla Frederick (P)2024 Kayla Frederick

Gory Horror Thriller

When several artists from various fields, all strangers, arrive to a remote island for a unique opportunity to earn an art residency and $500,000, questions proliferate. Why were each of THEM chosen? How can they compete for the residency when they each specialize in vastly different mediums? Who is their mysterious benefactor?

The competition begins before any one of them realizes it, and each is pitted against the others in stakes higher than their promised rewards. One by one each is eliminated, though unexpectedly a ninth player joins the game.

The narration of this story is excellent. Sometimes female narrators struggle with male voices. In this story there are several male characters and even various POV reads. Freya Victoria performed brilliantly throughout the story.

A twisted, unforgivable competition

Received as an audio copy to review by the narrator, this is an honest review. With a phenomenal performance by Freya Victoria, The Residency becomes this ultimate game of survival that feels as if the author Kayla Frederick was channeling something hauntingly familiar to the SAW movies as the story unfolds with terrifying intensity and realistic rawness. Eight different artists with their talents ranging everything from painting, street art to corporate logos are in need of elevating their art to finally make it finds themselves in the cross hairs of the mysterious individual only known as The Curator. With the offer of money none of them can refuse; they're brought to an isolated island and to the man's magnificent home; once they enter an eerie bunker these artists are plunged into a real life horror show as the grisly games The Curator wants to play to get a winner... puts their lives truly on the line, whether each of survive to play another round of meet a fate that cuts deeply into their souls as the bunker become a gory tomb. It's when a winner finally emerges... The Curator throws another dark twist that will shine a light of the true cost of the Curator's glorious offer.

Highly recommended.

A wild ride from start to finish

I love the Saw movies, so I knew after learning the premise that I was going to enjoy this one. And it didn't disappoint!

There's a lot of fun, creative kills, and I enjoyed all the art references too. It kind of reminded me of another horror novel I enjoyed that delves heavily into the art world (It Rides a Pale Horse by Andy Marino) though the stories themselves are entirely different.

4/5 stars, would recommend!

Great story!

This was a great story with great narration! The concept was good and from when action started it never stopped. Keeps you on the edge of your seat for sure! Add this to your listening favorites for sure!

dungeon

my recommendation on this is fleeting a bit but if you are in the macabre this is a great book for you to read if you are not interested in a lot of drama and very distinct triggers I would avoid this book it is very in-depth very hard to deal with toward the end and emotionally if you're not good as grounded it is so mind-blowing and unfortunately realistic that is going to last with you for a while.

Multiple POV, One Narrator

The story was interesting, very much giving Saw vibes. I struggled to understand whose perspective each chapter was from. I know it’s probably more expensive to hire multiple voice actors, but hearing the same voice when there are 10 different perspectives is tough.

It was ok

I think the narrator is what threw me. It was hard to really get into the story with the voices but the story itself wasn’t bad. Had very saw movies vibe as far as story line.

The narrator brought this book down.

3.5 rating overall. The narrator really made this a difficult read. All of her character voices where nasaly and whiney. The story had potential and if I had physically read this book, my experience may have been very different.

Thrilling Escape Room

This was my first Kayla Frederick book and it was a great start! I’ll be looking out for more.

8 artists go in, only 1 will come out; if you’re a fan of Saw/ Escape Rooms, you’ll enjoy this one!

It starts a little slow as you’re introduced to the characters, but once the games start, it picks up and keeps the pace, which I loved!

Although I was not a fan of the narrator, I did thoroughly enjoy the story. I feel if I had read it and not listened to it I would’ve liked it better.

I also would’ve appreciated more backstory to why these specific artists were picked by The Curator.

All in all it was worth the listen.

A big thank you to Kayla Frederick for the Audible Credit, I am leaving this review voluntarily.

*Spoiler*
I did not like that Isabella kept being overlooked and not mentioned when Ira would recall the other artists. I didn’t get why she kept getting left out.

Survivor on Steroids

Eight artists are given the chance to attend a workshop on a private island, with the winner of the competition getting lots of money. Of course, the reader knows that this isn't going to end well! The sponsor of this is known only as The Curator. There is some backstory to each of the artists (some more than others), but I would have liked to know more about the characters before their arrival on Turquoise Island.

Instead of learning more about art, the group is thrown into a bunker filled with competitions that will only allow one to come out on the other end. There are plenty of gruesome and horrific deaths along the way and the reader will cringe along the participants. All in all, this was a pretty good read, but I would have appreciated more background on all of the characters (especially The Curator and his mysterious assistant, Victoria).

The narrator tried to use different voices for this huge cast of characters (each chapter was written from a different one), but most of them fell short and were fairly annoying. I will admit that this could have partially due to my speeding up the narration (to get over this annoyance), but I think I would have probably enjoyed the book more if I had read a physical copy.

If you enjoy books where people are pitted against each other ala Survivor, you will probably enjoy this quick read. I just feel like it could have been much better.