How does the author use personification in the novel, The Abduction?

The Quincy District warehouse is a very sinister location. The idea of being alone in a darkened, emptied city with just one's abductors is frightening. Even when Meg finally frees herself from the warehouse interior, she finds that the entire neighborhood is, in a bizarre way, just a larger warehouse in and of itself. There is nowhere Meg can go because there is no living being save the kidnappers for miles around.

The setting herein acts almost as an active character rather than passive landscape as in most fiction. The warehouse seems to come alive, personified, as it "fights back" at Meg's efforts to secure freedom. Even though the warehouse is not really alive, the author uses the locale to impart a feeling that everything is working against Meg's best interests, even the warehouse itself.