History Literature / TheSouthernReachTrilogy

* MyGreatestFailure: Control's career in law enforcement was basically over after [[spoiler: he inadvertently tipped off a white supremacist group he was infiltrating to the identity of his informant, leading directly to her murder]].

* LonersAreFreaks: The biologist is extremely detached from the rest of humanity and overly-focused on certain details, leading her to get fired from most of the jobs she had and she was considered a poor candidate for the expedition. Which is why the director picked her. She's so intractable and freakishly self-contained that she [[spoiler:cannot be hypnotized and possibly caused her cloning to go wrong, resulting in Ghost Bird retaining far more individuality and memories than the other clones.]]

** After [[spoiler:the psychologist]] goes rogue one-third of the way into ''Annihilation'', everything about her gets increasingly shady and menacing. The biologist finds her [[spoiler:on death's door]] as the third act and final of the book begins, and while said meting is one of the most pivotal moments on the book, she doesn't show up again. [[spoiler:Apart from her clone on the finale of ''Authority'', or prominently returning in ''Acceptance'' in flashbacks.]]

The series consists of three volumes.

* {{Expy}}: Area X draws a lot of inspiration from [[Literature/RoadsidePicnic the]] [[Film/{{Stalker}} Zone]].

** Area X creates doppelgangers of the people who die or change in it, but these clones tend to be... [[UncannyValley off, with only superficial memories of the people they were based on and all with the same docile personality]].

The ''Southern Reach Trilogy'' is a book series written by Creator/JeffVanderMeer.

The Southern Reach is a secret government agency responsible for investigating and hiding the existence of Area X, a remote region of swamps and coastline which was one day surrounded by an invisible and nearly impenetrable barrier. Strange phenomena have been occurring in Area X ever since, and the Southern Reach has been sending in team after team in an attempt to find out what was responsible for the Area's creation -- and if it poses a danger to the outside world.

* AmbiguousDisorder: Between her complete disdain for all social interactions and completely analytical, unsentimental state of mind, the biologist doesn't seem to be psychologically normal. Several characters in "Authority" even point out how unusual her behavior is, but nothing concrete is ever said.

%%* AmbiguousDisorder: Between her complete disdain for all social interactions and completely analytical, unsentimental state of mind, the biologist doesn't seem to be psychologically normal.

* AmbiguousDisorder: Between her complete disdain for all social interactions and completely analytical, unsentimental state of mind, the biologist doesn't seem to be psychologically normal.
* AmbiguousEnding: As of ''Acceptance'': [[spoiler: Control has died, but his death triggers a change in the Crawler. Grace and Ghost Bird leave the tunnel and go past the remains of the Southern Reach. It's unknown whether there is a doorway out of Area X anymore and if the terraforming has extended to the rest of the Earth, or if Control's death has made the Crawler realize that its mission was pointless.]]

** In ''Acceptance'', [[ThreeLinesSomeWaiting several points in time are used to tell what is happening and what has happened in the past by way of the time and point of view changing each chapter]]. The lighthouse keeper serves as the point of view of pre-Area X times, the director's chapters reveal how the twelfth expedition came to be, and Ghost Bird and Control relate what is currently happening after the events of ''Authority''.

** Both the biologist and Saul the lighthouse keeper are heavily associated with birds. The biologist is nicknamed Ghost Bird by her late husband; and the lighthouse keeper is an avid bird watcher, writing down what kind of birds he's seen on any given day.

** The lighthouse in [[EldritchLocation Area X]] contains whole piles of apocalyptic logs: all expedition members keep a notebook of their experiences, and the notebooks of expeditions which never return always find their way to the lighthouse. By the time the biologist finds it, the pile has become alarmingly large.

** The middle portion of ''Annihilation'' has [[spoiler:the psychologist]] going rogue, and the potential threat she represents is the main issue at hand.

* BlueAndOrangeMorality: Near the end of the first book the biologist muses that her unusual attitude towards society and humanity in general makes her react, both emotionally and practically, very differently than most people would to her findings in Area X.
* BodyHorror: Expedition members are warned to avoid contamination by Area X as it's not know what happened to those who did not return. [[spoiler: Though most became part of Area X by turning into animals, some turned into grotesque monsters that are neither animal nor human. The psychologist of the last 11th expedition became the moaning creature, a monster with patchy white skin, too many extremities, a human face and a bone-slicing moan it cannot contain come evening.]]

** [[spoiler:Ghost Bird is off compared to the other clones. Normally the clones are indistinguishable from each other in what they know and how they act. Ghost Bird retains significantly more of the biologist's personality and memories of Area X.]]

* ChekhovsGun: The immortal plant and the cell phone that Control finds in the former director's office, which eventually [[spoiler: allow Area X to expand past the old border]].
* ClingyMacGuffin: An otherwise ordinary broken cellphone brought back from the EldritchLocation Area X, which always somehow returns after being thrown away. Control is stymied by his inability to get rid of it in ''Authority'', and flashbacks in ''Acceptance'' reveal that it had previously behaved in a similarly clingy fashion towards the psychologist..

# ''Acceptance'' brings it all together by revealing how Area X came to be and how the individual workings of the characters influence what it's going to become.

* AlienGeometries: [[spoiler:The Crawler.]] When it is described by the biologist she can barely comprehend its edges and while the omniscient narration in ''Acceptance'' does a bit better, it still cannot be grasped fully.

* AmbiguousEnding: As of ''Acceptance'': [[spoiler: Control has died, but his death triggers a change in the Crawler. Grace and Ghost Bird leave the tunnel and go past the remains of the Southern Reach. It's unknown whether there is a doorway out of Area X anymore and if the terraforming has extended to the rest of the Earth or if Control's death has made the Crawler realize that its mission was pointless.]]

** At some points in ''Annihilation'', the chronological narrative with take a step back to earlier points in the biologist's life, then segue from those points to the situation the biologist was in at that point in the expedition.
** In ''Authority'', Control's point of view, while linear in general, tends to jump around the way his thoughts do. One scene would happen, followed by another, only for the narration to skip back and retell elements from the previous scene that had not been told yet, again and again, revealing new layers and information each time.
** In ''Acceptance'', [[ThreeLinesSomeWaiting several points in time are used to tell what is happening and what has happened in the past by way of the time and point of view changing each chapter]]. The lighthouse keeper serves as the point of view of pre-Area X times, the director's chapters reveal how the twelfth expedition came to be, and Ghost Bird and Control relate what is currently happening.

** Area X creates doppelgangers of the people who die or change in it, but these clones tend to be... off, with only superficial memories of the original and all with the same docile personality.

* AmbiguousEnding: As of ''Accepance'': [[spoiler: Control has died, but his death triggers a change in the Crawler. Grace and Ghost Bird leave the tunnel and go past the remains of the Southern Reach. It's unknown whether there is a doorway out of Area X anymore and if the terraforming has extended to the rest of the Earth or if Control's death has made the Crawler realize that its mission was pointless.]]

** In ''Acceptance'', it is revealed that after resisting for 30 years in Area X, [[spoiler:the biologist ultimately also lost to the corrupting nature of the place]]. Its made ''particularly'' heartbreaking by the fact that [[spoiler:the biologist]] did not give up thanks to ThePowerOfLove, but once [[spoiler:the owl that her husband had been transformed into]] passes away, [[spoiler:she]] can't continue anymore, and lets it take over.

* AmbiguousEnding: [[spoiler: Control has died, but his death triggers a change in the Crawler. Grace and Ghost Bird leave the tunnel and go past the remains of the Southern Reach. It's unknown whether there is a doorway out of Area X anymore and if the terraforming has extended to the rest of the Earth or if Control's death has made the Crawler realize that its mission was pointless.]]

** In ''Acceptance'', several points in time are used to tell what is happening and what has happened in the past by way of the time and point of view changing each chapter. The lighthouse keeper serves as the point of view of pre-Area X times, the director's chapters reveal how the twelfth expedition came to be, and Ghost Bird and Control relate what is currently happening.

** Both the biologist and the lighthouse keeper are heavily associated with birds. The biologist is nicknamed Ghost Bird by her late husband and the lighthouse keeper is an avid bird watcher, writing down what kind of birds he's seen on any given day.

** In ''Acceptance'', the lighthouse keeper's journal details odd jobs and animal sightings around the lighthouse but gradually degenerates into apocalyptic babbling and unintelligible scribbles.

* AsTheGoodBookSays: The text lining the walls of the tower reads almost like a warped, vaguely sinister version of a Bible passage: ''Where lies the strangling fruit that came from the hand of the sinner I shall bring forth the seeds of the dead...'' It can be traced back to the lighthouse keeper due to semantic similarities, as he used to be a preacher.

* BittersweetEnding: The biologist [[spoiler: is transformed into an enormous, near-immortal alien with a thousand eyes who can live on land or sea and travel between worlds. Grace and Control are horrified, but for an extreme loner and detail-oriented observer fascinated by new places and transitional ecosystems -- is this such a terrible fate?]]

** Area X creates doppelgangers of the people who die in it, but they tend to be... off, with only superficial memories of the original and all with the same docile personality.

** After [[spoiler:the psychologist]] goes rogue 1/3 into ''Annihilation'', everything about her gets increasingly shady and menacing. The biologist finds her [[spoiler:on death's door]] as the third act and final of the book begins, and while said meting is one of the most pivotal moments on the book, she doesn't show up again. [[spoiler:Apart from her clone on the finale of ''Authority'', or prominently returning in ''Acceptance'' in flashbacks.]]

* DoomedHometown: [[spoiler:The director of the Southern Reach, who is also the psychologist from the 12th expedition,]] lived in "the forgotten coast", as the place that became Area X used to be known, as a child. This is why she was driven to work at the Southern Reach in the first place.
* DownerEnding: ''Authority'''s climax happens right after Control has defeated both of his opponents and Southern Reach starts making progress for once. [[spoiler:The psychologist's clone finally arrives at the Southern Reach, bringing Area X with her. The whole organization falls, Area X is spreading to other points as well, most of the cast is lost at Southern Reach and Control is forced to go into Area X with Ghost Bird on uncertain terms.]]
* DramaticIrony: In ''Authority'', the audience has gotten to read the biologist's notebook (ie, ''Annhilation''), but Control hasn't because the notebooks never make it back to base. So while the audience knows perfectly well that [[spoiler: that the "returned" members of the twelfth(ish) expedition can't possibly be the real deal]] he has no idea.

* EldritchAbomination: ''From the dim-lit halls of other places forms that never could be writhe...''
* EldritchLocation: Area X is one. It is separated from the rest of the world by an invisible barrier, with the only access being through a disorienting glowing corridor that takes between three and ten hours to reach the other side. The landscape inside seems similar to the environment outside, but [[YearInsideHourOutside time flows faster within its border]], the wildlife behaves strangely and the stars are in the wrong positions on certain nights...

* PosthumousCharacter: The biologist's husband died before she even went into Area X. Nonetheless, he is a very important character in the book and [[spoiler:his expedition journal]] is pivotal in the final acts of ''Annihilation''. [[spoiler:Or... his clone died. He survived inside Area X, but he was turned into an Owl by the corrupting nature of the place]]. Additionally, [[spoiler:the psychologist]] dies surprisingly early into the trilogy, at roughly 2/3s into ''Annihilation'', but she remains a extremely important character over the entire series due to the fact she [[spoiler:was Southern Reach's director]], and a key figure to many Southern Reach employees, who are mayor characters in ''Authority'' and ''Acceptance''. She is also very prominently featured in ''Acceptance'' in several flashbacks.

* NotSoStoic: An interesting example of in ''Annihalation''. The book is told by the biologist on first person, and [[spoiler: is her expedition diary]]. Her tone and voice never really wavers, making it seem like she is unshakable and unaffected by the horrors she is seeing. In a handful of blink-and-you-miss-it moments, the biologist directly comments on the fact that she is a bit shaken up, but only does so very briefly and it is not apparent in her narration. [[spoiler: As a diary, the passages were written after the events happened, so she was more calm]]. The biggest one is after her final conversation with the Psychologist. Through it the biologist seems fine and keeps a harsh mask to try and force answers out of the psychologist, but her narration later states that she was deeply shaken and unnerved by what she saw and learned. Its made much more apparent when she reads [[spoiler:her husband's journal]], by that point she was affected severely enough for emotion to be apparent in her narration (these are in fact among the few scenes ''in the whole trilogy'' it shows).

* LighthousePoint: The lighthouse is a prominent feature in Area X, which expeditions tend to be drawn to, [[spoiler:secretly directed by the Southern Reach to distract them from the topographical anomaly],] and where the expedition members' journals tend to end up in. It's made out to be a safe point but it's obvious that something horrible has happened inside at some point and someone's tried to turn it into a stronghold. There's another, ruined lighthouse on the island and much is made of a possible connection between the two. [[spoiler:It's not the lighthouse itself that's important, but the ''lens''.]]

* LighthousePoint: The lighthouse is a prominent feature in Area X, which expeditions tend to be drawn to [[spoiler:secretly directed by the Southern Reach to distract them from the topographical anomaly]] and where the expedition members' journals tend to end up in. It's made out to be a safe point but it's obvious that something horrible has happened inside at some point and someone's tried to turn it into a stronghold. There's another, ruined lighthouse on the island and much is made of a possible connection between the two. [[spoiler:It's not the lighthouse itself that's important, but the ''lens''.]]

* ItsPersonal: [[spoiler: The psychologist/director]] used to live in the place that became Area X and her mother disappeared together with everyone else within it when the border came down, which later motived her to work for the Southern Reach no matter the cost.

** In ''Acceptance'', it is revealed that after resisting for 30 years in Area X, [[spoiler:the biologist ultimately also lost to the corrupting nature of the place]]. Its made ''particularly'' heartbreaking by the fact that [[spoiler:the biologist]] did not gave up thanks to ThePowerOfLove, but once [[spoiler:the owl that her husband had been transformed into]] passes away, [[spoiler:she]] can't continue anymore, and lets it take over.

* BaldWomen: The returning expedition members have the hair shaved as part of the decontamination procedure. As a result, [[BadassBookworm the biologist]] is bald at the beginning of the second novel, ''Authority''.

** While Control's name is actually given right away in ''Authority'', he asks everyone to call him Control, which remains in place for the remainder of the trilogy. He is only addressed by his name on a handful of occasions or by family members. [[spoiler:Ghost Bird]] is allowed to call him John, but in ''Acceptance'' she notices that he asks her to revert back to calling him John after [[spoiler:they enter Area X]].

** While Control's name is actually given right away in ''Authority'', he asks everyone to call him Control, which remains in place for the remainder of the trilogy. He is only addressed by his name on a handful of occasions or by family members

* NatureLover: The biologist vastly prefers animals to people.