September 17, 2024
1 min read
Book Review: A Return to the Creepy Tensions of ‘Area X’
In Absolution, Jeff VanderMeer explores the mysteries in his Southern Reach Trilogy
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Absolution: A Southern Reach Novel
by Jeff VanderMeer.
MCD, 2024 ($30)
Told in three ominous narratives, writer and critic Jeff VanderMeer’s Absolution fills in the gaps from his enigmatic Southern Reach trilogy about the mysterious Area X. Old Jim, a reluctant and damaged agent with a secret government organization called Central, discovers 20-year-old archives of the first expedition to the area from biologists who encountered time dilations, animal mimics, a lighthouse emitting green energy and the enigmatic Rogue figure who terminated their research. Old Jim learns, among other things, that Central used brain augmentation and conditioning to control both scientists and animals. VanderMeer builds tension in these atmospheric and genuinely creepy tales that entertain as much as they disturb.
