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I recently finished the Annihilation series and I gotta say: it pwns. I like stuff that creeps me out and there are parts in these books that do it so well I probably won't ever stop thinking about them. Read that rear end.
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Apr 2, 2023 02:06
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Never heard of this before but the concept has me hooked. Fortunately my library has the whole series so once I work though my current back log I'm definitely checking it out. Oh this guy wrote Dead Astronauts, a book that from the cover and concept it looked like my wife would like it but it was a sequel so they couldn't figure it out. Sounds like it has Roadside Picnic/STALKER vibes so I'm super excited.
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Apr 2, 2023 02:11
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It's actually titled The Southern Reach trilogy, but I just call it the Annihilation series since it's the best shot anyone has of recognizing it, due to the 2018 movie adaptation of the first book. It is what it is.
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Apr 2, 2023 02:59
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First one's on my to do list, but I'm not huge on book series.
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Apr 2, 2023 03:04
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WHY BONER NOW posted:First one's on my to do list, but I'm not huge on book series. Me either, but they're relatively short reads.. especially the first one
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Apr 2, 2023 03:09
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I like Annihilation the movie a lot more than the book. They are very different. Vandermeer edited a fat short story anthology called The Weird that I liked a whole lot.
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Apr 2, 2023 03:36
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WILDTURKEY101 posted:I like Annihilation the movie a lot more than the book. They are very different. Vandermeer edited a fat short story anthology called The Weird that I liked a whole lot. I kinda agree, but I think a lot of that is due to the soundtrack
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Apr 2, 2023 03:45
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these books were good  only other thing I’ve read by VanderMeer was Borne, which is also good
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Apr 2, 2023 03:46
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCuBalItZA8
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Apr 2, 2023 03:54
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Daikatana Ritsu posted:I kinda agree, but I think a lot of that is due to the soundtrack The visuals were well done in the movie too. The book and movie are so different that they are kind of hard to compare. They both had an excellent but totally different final act, but at the end of the day the movie is asking me more interesting questions than the book is. The movie has a lot to say about love and loss. It asks us how much we adapt to loving someone, and how much of ourselves we give over to love. Complicated questions. The book was less complex, and had more typical ideas of love, like, how far can you go for it? Literally, to what depths? And it was still good, but I think the movie had more interesting things to say.
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Apr 2, 2023 04:10
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WILDTURKEY101 posted:The visuals were well done in the movie too. The book and movie are so different that they are kind of hard to compare. They both had an excellent but totally different final act, but at the end of the day the movie is asking me more interesting questions than the book is. The movie has a lot to say about love and loss. It asks us how much we adapt to loving someone, and how much of ourselves we give over to love. Complicated questions. The book was less complex, and had more typical ideas of love, like, how far can you go for it? Literally, to what depths? And it was still good, but I think the movie had more interesting things to say. the movie vastly undersells the psychologist's role but yeah you right
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Apr 2, 2023 04:30
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Read the books last year and loved them. Saw the movie and loved it. Great series.
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Apr 2, 2023 05:45
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Loved these books. Super creepy, loved the swampy environment setting, loved the tower, all the exploration and discovery, the growing realisation of things being hosed up, all of it. this track is so good!!! I still think about that one bit all the time.
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Apr 2, 2023 06:25
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I knew nothing about these books going in, they were great. Genuinely didn't know where they were going and there are some great ideas in them. I read them back to back and felt they dragged a bit, maybe the second two could have been condensed into one, but would strongly recommend. If you enjoyed them try Solaris (the book not the films)
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Apr 2, 2023 20:19
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i felt the second was a bit slower, but needed for the build up for the third. echoing most posters here i really loved the creepiness and I'm very excited to read other books of his. apparently he's working on a 4th!
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Apr 2, 2023 20:29
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greatly enjoyed the trilogy. took some doing to make a scene of a dude holding a mouse into something creepy i really like the ambergris books that vandermeer did a decade prior, but they're not really the same sort of oeuvre. less dread, more horrible wonder
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Apr 2, 2023 21:16
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I really enjoyed the character of Control. Like there is a lot that gets written about white collar professionals (see - Better Call Saul) that's good but doesn't really address the real non Euclidean terror of the white collar lifestyle. That terror is perfectly presented in Control who, at the end of the day, just isn't very good at his job. His bosses think he's a screw up, his subordinates don't respect him, when poo poo hits the fan he just sort of finds irrelevant make-work to fill the time and avoids doing anything but the bare minimum to cover his rear end. What I'm saying is that, as an accountant, he encapsulates the stuff that genuinely frightens me every day and the cosmic horror is just icing on the cake 
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Apr 2, 2023 22:59
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I'm reading Borne and Dead Astronauts right now I'll make sure to check that series out too
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Apr 2, 2023 23:44
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I was reading it but just kinda petered out halfway thru the 3rd book. It felt like too much, like at that point he was writing fanfic of the first book. Should I go back and give it a try again?
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Apr 3, 2023 03:35
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Sprue posted:I was reading it but just kinda petered out halfway thru the 3rd book. It felt like too much, like at that point he was writing fanfic of the first book. Should I go back and give it a try again? As a weirdo completionist I say yes, but if you don't feel like doing it then don't
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Apr 3, 2023 04:25
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Quinn's Ideas FTW. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tsFFPLHQi2A&t=393s
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Apr 3, 2023 04:38
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Sprue posted:I was reading it but just kinda petered out halfway thru the 3rd book. It felt like too much, like at that point he was writing fanfic of the first book. Should I go back and give it a try again? Same, 'cept I crapped out in the first couple dozen pages. I felt done with the series at that point, but I'll probably go back and re-read 'em all again, including finishing the third.
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Apr 3, 2023 05:04
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Finch was also good
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Apr 3, 2023 05:32
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doctorfrog posted:Same, 'cept I crapped out in the first couple dozen pages. I felt done with the series at that point, but I'll probably go back and re-read 'em all again, including finishing the third. This is exactly where I ended up with it. The more VanderMeer explains and expands the worse it gets. The second book in particular just felt like plate spinning.
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Apr 3, 2023 10:32
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DrVenkman posted:This is exactly where I ended up with it. The more VanderMeer explains and expands the worse it gets. The second book in particular just felt like plate spinning. I thought the second one was the scariest and most effective. The mix of bureaucracy and horror was distinctive and there were several “set pieces” (control going into his boss’s old house and the discovery of the mural) that have stuck with me for years. I love the first one too but find the second to be so memorable.
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Apr 3, 2023 13:58
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Daikatana Ritsu posted:the movie vastly undersells the psychologist's role but yeah you right The movie changes the psychologist a ton including getting rid of one of the main reasons the book is even called Annihilation. I really missed the mind control stuff in the movie. I like both but prefer the book by a lot. It's a tough one to adapt though, and I think they did about as good a job as could be expected. Really liked Control. The part when he realizes the guy who is living in the vents or whatever is still in there with him and has been the whole time is a really good payoff scare after all the buildup. Should get on reading the third one.
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Apr 3, 2023 16:41
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I read the book way after seeing the film but preferred the book by a mile. it was surreal and psychological in a way only writing can be and much more effective for it, like with the central set piece being both a tower and a tunnel simultaneously. the reality bending sense of everything feeling like a dream from a science fiction angle rather than a magical realism one was refreshing, and the tension is piled on so well in the last bit with the surveyor, the thing in the reeds, and with the crawler & psychologist in general. the thing in the reeds was so much better than any action scene in the film, you just can't beat the fear of something totally unseen & unknown imo. it was on par with the feeling of mystery and dread the space jockey in Alien gave me as a kid. poo poo was great
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Apr 4, 2023 03:05
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Movie and books are all good as gently caress
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Apr 4, 2023 03:15
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Apr 4, 2023 03:53
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I got the trilogy a little after seeing the movie but I have yet to actually read it.. Maybe I will start now.
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Apr 4, 2023 04:18
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FakeBlood posted:I got the trilogy a little after seeing the movie but I have yet to actually read it.. Maybe I will start now. you should
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Apr 4, 2023 04:32
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Apr 4, 2023 04:34
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Both the book and the movie rocked my cock off. Love this type of poo poo, can anyome recommend some more books like it?
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Apr 4, 2023 05:45
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This might seem like a weird recommendation, but Piranesi by Susannah Clarke might be up your alley depending on the reasons you enjoyed Annihilation. It's about a man in a very strange environment trying to understand the nature of the place he's in and how he ended up there. It hasn't got the same creepy, weird-fiction vibe as Annihilation, but I think there's parallels in seeking to unravel the mysteries of a strange location.
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Apr 4, 2023 05:58
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piranesi is very good but yeah, it has the same "this was better before it was explained" kind of vibe. agree that it is in no way as creepy, it's just faintly melancholic and industrious
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Apr 4, 2023 09:09
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distortion park posted:I knew nothing about these books going in, they were great. Genuinely didn't know where they were going and there are some great ideas in them. I read them back to back and felt they dragged a bit, maybe the second two could have been condensed into one, but would strongly recommend. th tarkovsky solaris kicks rear end but yeah the book is king
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Apr 4, 2023 14:42
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lol
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Apr 4, 2023 15:21
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verbal enema posted:I'm reading Borne and Dead Astronauts right now I'll make sure to check that series out too
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Apr 4, 2023 15:33
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Oh Roadside Picnic is a good rec too, that's the book Stalker the film is based on
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Apr 5, 2023 03:16
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I loved the first and third books, but was really lukewarm on the second. It’s not bad by any means, but I struggled a bit, although it’s been long enough since I read them that I struggle to fully articulate why. I’m glad I powered through and would highly recommend reading all three to everyone here, I just wanted to put this here so anyone equally discouraged by book 2 would keep going because it’s worth it.
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Apr 5, 2023 04:03
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