Annihilation

By Jeff Vandermeer
  • Fiction
  • Horror
  • Science Fiction

For thirty years, shadowy government organisation ‘The Southern Reach’ has sent eleven expeditions into the mysterious Area X- a vast patch of wilderness whose invisible borders materialised suddenly, impenetrable with the exception of one small entrance. Every expedition has ended with few survivors- most lost to gunfire, madness or terminal post-expedition cancer. Four women make up the twelfth expedition into Area X- one a biologist determined to find out why her husband, who disappeared on the eleventh expedition, reappeared a year later in their kitchen with no memory. Recently adapted for the big screen in the US (and for the smaller Netflix screen in the UK & Ireland) starring Natalie Portman and directed by Ex Machina writer/director Alex Garland, this science fiction eco-horror will have you alternately scratching your head and compulsively page turning well into the night. Loaded with mystery and action, Annihilation questions what makes us human, explores morality and dispels any illusion of mankind’s dominion over the nature. A thought provoking, darkly compulsive read.

Staff Pick By
Deanna