Authority

The second terrifying and hair-raising chapter in the Southern Reach Trilogy

Thirty years on, human interaction with Area X—a seemingly hostile land bounded by an impenetrable barrier and inexplicably stripped of all traces of civilization—has consisted only of a handful of missions managed by a government organization so covert that it has all but vanished: the Southern Reach. The agency is in total chaos after the turbulent twelfth trip detailed in Annihilation.

"Control" or John Rodríguez has been named the new leader of the Southern Reach. Control starts to uncover the mysteries of Area X with the help of a mistrustful but frantic squad, a string of tedious interrogations, a hidden note cache, and hours of very unsettling video footage. However, every revelation forces him to face up to uncomfortable realities about both the organization he has sworn to serve and himself.

The most unsettling issues about Area X are resolved in Authority, the second book in Jeff VanderMeer's Southern Reach trilogy, but the resolutions are by no means comforting.