Jeff VanderMeer 

Jeff VanderMeer is the author of Hummingbird Salamander, the Borne novels (Borne, The Strange Bird, and Dead Astronauts), and The Southern Reach Trilogy (Annihilation, Authority, and Acceptance), the first volume of which won the Nebula Award and the Shirley Jackson Award and was adapted into a movie by Alex Garland. He speaks and writes frequently about issues relating to climate change as well as urban rewilding. VanderMeer lives in Tallahassee, Florida, on the edge of a ravine, with his wife, Ann VanderMeer, and their cat, Neo.

Instagram: @jeff-Vandermeer123
Website: jeffvandermeer.com

FESTIVAL SHOWS

THE FUTURE IS WILD

Starring Madeline Ashby & Jeff VanderMeer
Oct. 18 @ 5:30 PM $25
Memorial Park Library, 2nd Floor

An Evening with Stephen Graham Jones & Jeff VanderMeer

Hosted by Eric Volmers
Oct. 19 @ 7:30 PM $25
Memorial Park Library, 2nd Floor

FESTIVAL BOOK

Absolution: A Southern Reach Novel

The surprise fourth volume in Jeff VanderMeer’s Southern Reach series—and the final word on one of the most provocative and popular speculative fiction series of our time.

When the Southern Reach trilogy was first published a decade ago, it was an instant sensation, celebrated in a front-page New York Times story before publication, hailed by Stephen King and many others. Each volume climbed the bestseller list; awards were won; the books made the rare transition from paperback original to hardcover; the movie adaptation became a cult classic. All told, the trilogy has sold more than a million copies and has secured its place in the pantheon of 21st-century literature.

And yet for all this, for Jeff VanderMeer there was never full closure to the story of Area X. There were a few mysteries that had gone unsolved, some key points of view never aired. There were stories left to tell. There remained questions about who had been complicit in creating the conditions for Area X to take hold; the story of the first mission into the Forgotten Coast—before Area X was called Area X—had never been fully told; and what if someone had foreseen the world after Acceptance? How crazy would they seem?

Structured in three parts, each recounting a new expedition, Absolution is a brilliant, beautiful, and ever-terrifying plunge into unique and fertile literary territory. There are some long-awaited answers here, to be sure, but also more questions, and profound new surprises. It is the final word on one of the most provocative and popular speculative fiction series of our time.

GET THE BOOK

Owl’s Nest Books | Calgary Public Library | Audio coming soon 

BE CURIOUSER

  • I’ve Lived with Hurricanes for Years. The Decisions Keep Getting Harder. –Jeff VanderMeer, The New York Times
  • Dead Astronauts Author Jeff VanderMeer On the Power—and Danger—of Climate Fiction. –Esquire
  • We Need Speculative Fiction Now More Than Ever. –Esquire
  • Jeff VanderMeer Interview: “Fiction isn’t supposed to always be comfortable” –Three Crows Magazine