'I wish we could preserve our relationship as it is now for a long time. I wish we could remain strangers.'A man walks across an old European capital. Heavy snow falls. He has come here from far away, hoping to forget. Instead, he remembers: home, war, lost friends. Complicity. In the company of a new friend and alive to the new experiences of the city, he moves through the snow and his complicated history in search of an apartment.'Exceptional -- a book rich in ideas and poetry. Its power is accumulative and it moves with a calm and yet ineitable progress. It is a deeply mysterious and admirable book.' Hisham Matar'The Apartment is a wonderfully beguiling novel, evoking to perfection that sense of eerie possibility one has when in a strange city. Its account of a new friendship poised on the edge of love is superbly sure-footed.' Adam Thorpe'The Apartment is a small novel -- but it's actually huge. Clever, entertaining, brave; it stretches the rules while following a man through one day of his life. I loved it.' Roddy Doyle'Baxter is a serious, thoughtful writer, bent on emotional truth and artistry.' Suzi Feay, Financial Times'A stunning book -- beautifully, constructed, elegantly written and deeply felt.' Stuart Evers