Annihilation Review

This week's novel is Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer.  It was a quick, creepy read with mystery and atmosphere.

This is the story of the twelfth expedition into Area X, an idyllic wilderness where previous expeditions either died violently when they turned on each other or returned changed with reports of hallucinations and paranoia.  There's an unearthly cry at dusk; an abandoned, dilapidated village; a barricaded lighthouse riddled with signs of violence; and a tower that descends into the earth with strange writing on the wall.  To piece together the secrets of Area X, they have to find the truth about what happened to the other expeditions and what lies they were told during training.

The story is told through the journal of the biologist, who approaches the trip with scientific curiosity, jumping head first into the mysteries instead of letting them simmer in the background.  This means the whole story lasts only a few days, and it means the action clips along.  Through her journal, she tells us that she wants to be unbiased, however, she then later admits to keeping secrets to appear more unbiased so the reader would believe her, which throws her whole story and her motivations into question.

Area X is creepy.  Not in an "ewww! A centipede!" way, but in an eerie way that makes the hairs on the back of your neck stand up.  As a wuss when it comes to horror, I prefer this to being honestly terrified while reading.  The moments of surprise are more emotionally stunning than frightening.  This is accomplished in part by how the biologist's emotions are conveyed, and how she feels more unsettled than frightened.  Then part of it is because the horror is ambiguous.  It's hard to tell if the expedition is hallucinating or if the weirdness is supernatural.  It's hard to tell because we know both are happening, so pinning down any one moment as real or not is impossible.

In the end, not all the mysteries of Area X are explained, but the biologist's journey feels satisfying.  Even more interesting is that VanderMeer shows the monster without the monster losing all its creepy charisma.  I think these two points are related.  If everything was explained, if every monster was shown, the story would suddenly be too neat, too sensical.  But VanderMeer only shows the monster that the biologist was most interested in, while large portions of Area X and it's history remain a mystery.  It's just enough.  It gets to the heart of the biologist's story without dismantling the eerie environment.

***

Next week: Station Eleven, literary post-apocalypse by Emily St. John Mandel