Just finished reading Annihilation - strange book

After seeing it on the list in this thread, I decided to read Annihilation, and I just finished it. As others said it’s weird (I like weird, so it’s one of the reasons I wanted to read it). The writing style really reminded me of H.P. Lovecraft, which is to say it’s a bit stilted. I’m glad I read it - it’s an interesting world and the story is told in an interesting way - but it’s not a book I’ll recommend to a lot of my friends. Some of them, maybe.

Have any of you read it? What did you think?

nodimetotie,

A little late for the discussion, but wanted to share my thoughts anyway.

I also picked up the book after seeing it on the same list =) Actually, the first time I thought about it was when the movie came out. I was super excited about it (Alex Garland!) but it somehow did not click with me. And then I read the book synopsis and decided to pass. Then this list came up and I finally decided to give it a try. And like many others here, I did not find it all that appealing. I guess it is original and, tbh, I finished it very quickly, intrigued by what would happen next. I liked the mystery of it but not the weirdness. Sometimes it feels like the story is grounded in reality. But sometimes it feels surreal. I can see a parallel with Kafka.

I am curious though if anyone found some hidden meanings and clues one might miss on the first reading. It does feel like the author hid a few things here and there behind words.

One thing I did like and could relate to, was the protagonist, the biologist. She explains how she often got “carried away,” worked on something she personally enjoyed instead of on things that would bring her money. It tells a cautionary tale. The biologist did not end up well. And she was a mess.

Not sure if I would have finished it had it been longer. Definitely not looking forward to the rest of the trilogy.

AFKBRBChocolate,

Thanks for the thoughts.

When I think back on the books, I feel like the most impactful part for me was the relationship between the biological and her husband, even though we never meet him. What the author did best was show that growth and progression.

I enjoyed the weirdness, but combining it with the super slow pacing just made it feel unpleasant. I feel that way about some Lovecraft stories.

nodimetotie,

Their relationship was probably one of the most grounded elements in the story.

misericordiae,

I saw the movie first, then read the book after hearing it was different/maybe better, since aside from the bear, I found the movie fairly whelming. I ended up really enjoying the book, particularly the dream-like style. Authority, however, I found... really slow. I was intrigued by the premise, and the reveals were interesting, but the pacing was just glacial, imo, and it did away with what I'd liked about Annihilation. I did start Acceptance afterward, but was sort of over it at that point, and never finished it.

lucho,

I started with the movie, i really like it, maybe not “the best of all” sci fi but it has his ways, i personally see something from Solaris (the book) inside of it, and i love Lem Stanislaw.

A couple of years later i discover that there where three books of the series, some time later i started to read them.

The first book was in some ways predictable, not for the plot per se, but because i watched the movie and i was specting something similar. I liked the book and i wanted to get more.

The second book is some kind of “outside” of the first one, other story, other ways, but the same feeling and one step up in the general trama. First i was confused but when i started to advance in the reading i liked more and more.

The third book is the book that work as the closure and unite the previous two, is good and has a good ending (in my opinion) that concuerds with the overall trama. Is more like the first book and more lightweight that the second.

Finally, i liked all the books, also they make the movie more interesting in good ways. Nice sci fi from a good author.

AFKBRBChocolate,

Okay, thanks for the input

AcornCarnage,
@AcornCarnage@lemmy.world avatar

I liked it. Authority was decent. But I couldn’t finish Acceptance. There was just nothing in it that made me want to keep reading.

But yeah, not anything I’d recommend to people I know.

Obi,
@Obi@sopuli.xyz avatar

I can’t remember it that well but I remember having an OK time with it and indeed thinking it was pretty weird, like taking LSD kind of weird.

Moghul,

I love how almost no one liked it in this thread, including me. I think the book is conveyed to the reader by the MC after the transformation happens which is why she feels like such an overanalyzer.

It’s hard to say if she really was neurodivergent before going in, but I think few normal people have sex with their husband “to own them” and vamoose in the middle of the night to stare at puddles in an empty lot while behaving secretive enough to appear like they’re hiding something really bad.

I don’t know. This book wasn’t for me and I won’t be reading the rest of the series.

Cruxifux,

I love this series.

wendymetcalfe,
@wendymetcalfe@mastodon.social avatar

@AFKBRBChocolate Yep, it is. And creepy, too.

SynopticVision,

Annihilation is a good book, but the hype it got is much more due to:

  • the fact that it arrived at the peak of the new wave of interest for Weird lit,
  • its (again, very timely) environmental spin to weird fiction,
  • the fact that Vandermeer worked a lot to present himself as THE authority on Weird fiction, with his articles, collections, prefaces to reissues of older books and so forth.
AFKBRBChocolate,

I missed all the hype and only heard about it more recently, so my expectations were a bit lower. It was good, but it had flaws in my opinion.

randomsnark,

I actually just read it for the first time in the past few days too. After all the hype, I was a bit let down although I still found it somewhat engaging. Its real strength is the dreamlike style, although that often seemed conscious and artificial - I occasionally became very aware that I was reading something the author had intentionally crafted to be stylistic, which took me out of the experience. I was surprised by how little happened over the course of the book, how little characterization there was (apart from the main character, largely fleshed out through constant flashbacks rather than a sense of her personality), and how flat the dialogue was. The way of alluding to the indescribable and incomprehensible was enjoyable, but nothing new. I’ll still read the next two though (already started the second).

I also found their mind-control depiction of hypnosis to be a bit unrealistic for my liking. I know it’s a book about reality warping madness, but it seemed like everything outside of Area X was supposed to be essentially present day reality, which the hypnosis isn’t.

AFKBRBChocolate,

Yep, I agree with what you said, including the hypnosis stuff being unrealistic - it doesn’t work that way. I’ll be interested in your thoughts on the second; I’m going to hold off on it.

canadrian,

It was pretty good. Didn’t make a huge impression on me, but I enjoyed it. Unfortunately the second book in the trilogy is ridiculously confusing and all over the place, and the third book is largely written in a highly disconcerting and off-putting second-person perspective. Oh and the ending is far from satisfying. Just my 2¢.

AFKBRBChocolate,

I have had anyone strongly recommend the trilogy yet. I get the impression that once you’re fine with the first book, there’s not a lot of rain to keep going.

mayo,
@mayo@lemmy.world avatar

I read it because someone at work recommended it to me but I didn’t find it very compelling. I think I read all of the books in the Southern Reach trilogy. It didn’t strike me as being anything special, just average sci-fi.

I didn’t like the movie either.

AFKBRBChocolate,

I’m getting to be pretty much a hermit, and didn’t realize there’s a movie of it until someone mentioned it in that other thread. Didn’t sound like a must-see.

I might read the next in the series, but it’s way down on the list.

Holyhandgrenade,
@Holyhandgrenade@lemmy.world avatar

The movie is one of my favorite sci-fi movies ever! It’s nothing like the book except for the premise, and way better than the book. I can’t recommend it enough!

AFKBRBChocolate,

Oh, interesting to hear

Hadriscus,

Well I had no idea there was a book ! stumbled upon your thread by accident. I really liked the movie, perhaps I should try the book.

AFKBRBChocolate,

I hadn’t known there was a movie until recently, and I haven’t seen it, so I can’t tell you how it compares. Some comments on this thread talk about it.

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