Wednesday, 27 May 2015

Authority - James VanderMeer

Yo Guys!
Joe here with another review for you all! :)


Today I’m going to be reviewing ‘Authority’ by Jeff VanderMeer!
I read and reviewed the first book in this series a while back and I’ve been really looking forward to progressing through this trilogy!

You can check out my review of ‘Annihilation’ here:
http://bookolio.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/book-review-annihilation-by-jeff.html

Here’s a bit of Authority’s blurb to get you intrigued:
After the twelfth expedition, the Southern Reach is in disarray, and John Rodriguez (aka “Control”) is the team’s newly appointed head. From a series of interrogations, a cache of hidden notes, and more than two hundred hours of profoundly troubling video footage, the secrets of Area X begin to reveal themselves
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I received this book as a review book from Goodreads!

This book was a crazy rollercoaster of intensity, confusion, realism and awesomeness!

The story is really awesome!
It’s weird how the author describes every little thing about every little thing and still makes it super enjoyable!
The way he switches between Control driving towards the Area X entrance gate and the discussions he has with other members of his team.
The writing is so very beautiful and pristine in this book.

I liked how we see Area X in this new perspective of how instead of it being a hostile area and a strange new place, we see it as this scientific anomaly which is scared to be referred as ‘alien’ or ‘unknown’, this take on it was pretty awesome as it gave us a new understanding on what forces are at work.
And how much of an impact Area X has had on the Southern Reach, which is the facility researching the Anomalies of Area X and keeping it safe from the public while trying to understand why it is there in the first place.

I thoroughly enjoyed the first book in this trilogy and I could not wait to start this one.
The main thing I find interesting with the author is his wording and his sentence structures. They are so very convoluted and intricate that some-parts don’t make sense to me? I’m not sure though, it could be that I’m not as intelligent at putting sentences together like the author is but some of it just doesn’t sit right with me, but it could be unintentionally confusing as the one I’m reading is a ‘Uncorrected Proof Copy’ from Goodreads.

Though the actual sentence structures and the way it is lain out is pretty damn sweet! I do really like the wording though as its very cleverly written and the actual wording itself is really intelligent!

The story is super gripping aswell, I keep wanting to explore Area X a-lot more but I realised this is a book more about the actual discovery and secrecy behind the habitat called Area X and why Area X is a thing and I am so in love with this idea!
Even though the book was slightly convoluted and a tad bit confusing, after each paragraph there was a short explanation which lead into another thing which happened that made the premise become more simpler and understandable.

The characters are well thought out honestly, we have Control or John Rodriguez who is this analytical, smart guy who likes to have everything in order and always uses factual evidence when talking. I generally really like Control, as he’s a very peculiar person with his quirks and genius.
Control as a character, he seems to have this air of status; I do enjoy his thought processing’s of ideas, situations and other climaxes within this book, it allows for us as a reader to understand a character who isn’t as developed as most lead/main characters are, it shows a sense of slow progression that gives us as readers a chance to actually gain a notion for his actions and thought-process.

We also have Ghost-Bird, who was the Biologist in Expedition 12 who was the main focus in the first book.
Ghost-Bird is the strong and silent type, which is completely understandable from the events of Annihilation. I really like the whole interrogation scenes between Ghost-Bird and Control; Ghost-Bird is so sassy and deceptive that it makes it so much more immersive.

All in all, I really enjoyed this book and I cannot wait to progress onto the last book in the series ‘Acceptance’
You can check out the book on Goodreads here:

And you can purchase it here on Amazon:
UK:

USA:

Area X as it is, is honestly my second favourite in my series list (being beaten by the Mistborn Series, because Sanderson) But this book was just so clever and witty that I can’t believe I put it down last year, I feel like a fool, a fool who done corrected himself right now!


Thank you all for reading this review!
You’re great! J
Joe :D

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