Annihilation
Registered by 
GoryDetails
of Nashua, New Hampshire USA on 8/21/2019
This Book is Currently in the Wild!
GoryDetails of Nashua, New Hampshire USA on 8/21/2019 This Book is Currently in the Wild!
1 journaler for this copy...
I got this movie-tie-in softcover at Barnes and Noble, for another release copy. (The 2018 film wasn't bad, but for me it wasn't as effective as the novel.)
The story deals with a mysterious Area X, which has somehow become cut off from the surrounding areas by a strange wall/force-field/something, through which there is a single opening that is used by scientific teams to attempt to learn more about the anomaly. Unfortunately, Very Bad Things have happened to most of the previous teams, from total destruction to an apparently-safe return that resulted in the rapid deaths-by-cancer of the returnees - who were not acting like themselves anyway, leading to strong suspicions that the ones who came back weren't the ones who went.
This book's told from the viewpoint of one member of the 12th expedition, a woman whose husband returned with the previous expedition (if it was actually him...) and who is now dead. She's "the biologist" (none of the team uses actual names), and we see the events through her eyes, starting with a relatively mundane trek into Area X and gradually ramping up into increasingly weird, vaguely Lovecraftian "eldritch horror" situations. (That "tower", aka a tunnel that may be alive and may be sentient and is inscribed with letters in living moss...)
The environment affects the explorers in different ways, and it becomes clear that at least one of them had a very different agenda than the rest, but this book raises many more questions than it answers. Who are the people in the photos in the lighthouse? Where did Area X come from, and what is it exactly? What is the huge creature that thrashes and moans in the swamp? And then there's that secret chamber in the lighthouse... "Can you really imagine what it was like in those first moments, peering down into that dark space, and seeing that? Perhaps you can. Perhaps you're staring at it now."
[There's a TV Tropes page for the Southern Reach trilogy, of which this is the first book.]
See also:
Authority
Acceptance
The story deals with a mysterious Area X, which has somehow become cut off from the surrounding areas by a strange wall/force-field/something, through which there is a single opening that is used by scientific teams to attempt to learn more about the anomaly. Unfortunately, Very Bad Things have happened to most of the previous teams, from total destruction to an apparently-safe return that resulted in the rapid deaths-by-cancer of the returnees - who were not acting like themselves anyway, leading to strong suspicions that the ones who came back weren't the ones who went.
This book's told from the viewpoint of one member of the 12th expedition, a woman whose husband returned with the previous expedition (if it was actually him...) and who is now dead. She's "the biologist" (none of the team uses actual names), and we see the events through her eyes, starting with a relatively mundane trek into Area X and gradually ramping up into increasingly weird, vaguely Lovecraftian "eldritch horror" situations. (That "tower", aka a tunnel that may be alive and may be sentient and is inscribed with letters in living moss...)
The environment affects the explorers in different ways, and it becomes clear that at least one of them had a very different agenda than the rest, but this book raises many more questions than it answers. Who are the people in the photos in the lighthouse? Where did Area X come from, and what is it exactly? What is the huge creature that thrashes and moans in the swamp? And then there's that secret chamber in the lighthouse... "Can you really imagine what it was like in those first moments, peering down into that dark space, and seeing that? Perhaps you can. Perhaps you're staring at it now."
[There's a TV Tropes page for the Southern Reach trilogy, of which this is the first book.]
See also:
Authority
Acceptance
Journal Entry 2 by GoryDetails at Little Free Library, Angel Trace and Gabriel in Ellington, Connecticut USA on Sunday, August 25, 2019
GoryDetails at Little Free Library, Angel Trace and Gabriel in Ellington, Connecticut USA on Sunday, August 25, 2019
Released 4 yrs ago (8/26/2019 UTC) at Little Free Library, Angel Trace and Gabriel in Ellington, Connecticut USA
WILD RELEASE NOTES:
I left this book in this colorful Little Free Library; hope someone enjoys it![See other recent releases in CT here.]
*** Released for the 2019 One-Word Title release challenge. ***
*** Released for the 2019 Science Fiction release challenge. ***
*** Released for the 2019 Movie release challenge. ***
