Borne, by Jeff VanderMeer

Borne by Jeff VanderMeer

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I've just gotten around to reading Borne (partly because I do most of my reading from libraries, and the wait for this work was really long). It seems like most of the rest of the universe has reviewed it already. But I'll second the others that see this work as a rich and demanding read. You have to work at a VanderMeer novel. But I've read Finch, and the Southern Reach trilogy--VanderMeer is continuing to change as an author, and I was less put off and more intrigued by this book than the others. The characters suffer desperately, sometimes extravagantly, but the protagonist is incredibly whole and powerful, even when she is dealing with huge gaps in her history. I enjoy how VanderMeer juxtaposes the detailed descriptions of the difficulty of Rachel and Wick (the main supporting character)'s lives with throwaways about how long they have been at it (many years). It's a dystopia, but collapse is slow, and never quite final.

I enjoyed it all the way through and I'm not surprised that VanderMeer is breaking out in popular culture, though "Annihilation" is not likely to be my kind of movie. A strong 4 stars.



View all my reviews