Acceptance

Acceptance by Jeff VanderMeer
Published: 2014
Series: Southern Reach #3
Length: 341 pages

This is the third novel in the Southern Reach trilogy and a fitting conclusion to the series. Conclusion may actually be too strong a word, as there’s a lot left open, but I was happy with how the story finished.

The basic idea of this trilogy is that members of the Southern Reach agency are monitoring and examining a town and its surrounding area, Area X, where strange phenomena have occurred. The border to this area isn’t visible, but once you walk through everything changes – the inhabitants have been wiped out, decades of time seem to have passed, and the survey teams sent in return changed somehow with little memory of what happened, if they even return at all. It has a Roadside Picnic feel to it, although it’s ultimately a very different story.

Throughout this trilogy, VanderMeer does a great job of slowly giving answers while raising more questions at the same time. The reader is constantly driven to learn what’s happening but doesn’t end up feeling completely unsatisfied with the progression. Characters, and our understanding of them, change dramatically as the story goes on. Even the point of view changes from first-person to third-person after the first novel. It’s not fast-paced horror, more of a slowly building psychological thriller, but I was engaged from start to finish.

This last book does leave an awful lot unanswered, and while I do yearn to have all of the answers handed to me in a nice little package, this did linger on my mind for longer than it may have otherwise. The characters also aren’t in a position to have everything answered nicely, so it would be difficult to contort this into a clean Disney ending. Part of me does hope, however, that a fourth book is eventually released, but I have a feeling that won’t happen and that is probably for the best. I had a lot of fun reading through different theories after finishing this. Leaving so much open is a tricky line to walk. It can easily feel like sloppy writing, but I came out of this with the feeling that it was all intentional. VanderMeer has the answers and just didn’t disclose the whole picture to the reader, letting them come to their own conclusions.

I really enjoyed this whole trilogy. I think above all else, it’s the atmosphere that I love. These are some of the eeriest books I’ve read.