Eli est un clochard, brisé, au bout du rouleau, Belle une prostituée qui cherche à fuir son mac. Matthew est un jeune homosexuel, Seven un tueur à gages sans pitié. Ils ne se connaissent pas mais se retrouvent ensemble sur le même bateau... en partance pour l'Enfer. Un Enfer un peu particulier, qui pourrait être New York mais n'en est qu'une copie... franchement décalée. Tous quatre, armés de leurs seuls soucis et accompagnés par un étrange personnage, n'ont plus alors qu'une idée en tête : trouver un moyen de s'évader. Après le monumental Livre de toutes les heures (Vélum et Encre, parus dans la collection Lunes d'encre aux Editions Denoël), Hal Duncan offre avec Evadés de l'Enfer ! un court roman explosif qui confirme tout son talent. ( )

Ce roman de Hal Duncan est l'équivalent au cinéma d'un bon film de série B. À savoir de l'action, de l'adrénaline et des explosions ! Et cela se lit comme un tel film se regarde : on en prend plein les yeux, on passe un bon moment mais une fois terminé, il n'en reste pas grand chose. ( )

For the cast of Hal Duncan's latest novella, the end of their lives is only the beginning. A homeless man jumps to his death from a rooftop; a prostitute is murdered by her pimp; a young man dies of his injuries on a hospital operating table; a hitman is shot dead in a warehouse gunfight. All four of them then find themselves on a boat sailing in to dock at a strange city, beneath a sign that begins "Abandon hope...".

And then, of course ... well, look, I think the title of the book is pretty self-explanatory, no?

Duncan's Hell owes more to Orwell or Kesey than it does to Dante, and is a thoroughly horrible place; a twisted version of New York built over an enormous prison-asylum. Fortunately for the reader, Duncan doesn't spend too long wallowing in all the misery, but immediately cuts to the dramatic breakout attempts, and the ensuing chaos and revelations that that all leads to.

While there are plenty of thematic similarities between this and Duncan's Vellum/Ink duology, this is closer in spirit to his short story "Die! Vampire! Die!" than anything else I can think of: a sleek and stylish novelisation of a B-movie nobody has ever had the budget to make (in fact, it seems that the story began life as a tongue-in-cheek pitch for just such a movie - be prepared for massive spoilers if you click the link though). Anyway, it's short (well under two hundred pages), fast-paced, and -- given all the gloomy metaphysical baggage - a lot of fun. Particularly recommended for people who thought Duncan's debut suffered from a lack of focus - personally I'm more interested in Duncan's next full-length work, but this is a nice way of passing the time until then.