Reviews with content warning for Death of parent - Authority

Reviews tagging 'Death of parent'

Authority by Jeff VanderMeer

12 reviews

jess2obsess's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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bomenvernietiger's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

Brave choice to not feature a new expedition into the area at all, and to completely rely on the academic and administrative side of the plot, but it pays off. Because of this, the story sometimes gets a little too slow, but overall the slow-burn works well.

Very colourful prose, sometimes trying a little too much to be clever, occasionally leading to metaphors and expressions that are just a little weird.

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mosshaunt's review against another edition

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dark mysterious slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

struggled to get through this one. something about it made me reread passages a lot, thinking i missed something.

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calico_camaraderie's review against another edition

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mysterious tense

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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bedtimesnack's review against another edition

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mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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jiaojiao's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

Jeff VanderMeer’s Authority is a much more character-driven story than its prequel, Annihilation, which also, unfortunately, made it feel a lot slower than Annihilation to me. Authority follows John “Control” Rodriguez, an agent sent to the Southern Reach to take on the role of its new (and perhaps only interim) director after the former director fails to return with the other members of the expedition team. John attempts to unravel the mystery of Area X from the outside in, beginning with interviewing the Biologist (who seems to have returned from Area X unscathed), and working through the haphazard notes left by the former director. Unfortunately, his presence is unwanted at the Southern Reach—and the reasons for that are hidden in an unexpected conspiracy set into motion long before John had been chosen to go to the Southern Reach.

Like Annihilation, Authority switches between present events and an intensely introspective look at select events from the character’s past. Unlike Annihilation, these events don’t seem to relate directly to the mystery of Area X; instead, they seem to exist primarily to provide insight into John’s character and motivations. Worse, the frequent narrative switch to his past interrupted any sense of eeriness/creepiness that the present events were struggling to maintain.

It became clear halfway through the novel that VanderMeer had no intentions of solving the mystery of Area X in Authority. I thought VanderMeer had done an amazing job of setting the scene and mood in Annihilation; Authority felt like a diversion from both that was unnecessarily long while contributing very little to the story.

Aside from that issue, I didn’t like John as a character at all, and I struggled a lot with connecting with him. That could definitely have influenced how much I like (or dislike) Authority as a novel.

My rating system:

★☆☆☆☆ - DNF.
★★☆☆☆ - I really wish I’d read something else.
★★★☆☆ - Glad I finished, but I’m probably not re-reading this.
★★★★☆ - I really enjoyed reading this! Would probably rec/re-read.
★★★★★ - OMG.

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