“Some of VanderMeer’s best writing.”
—Alec Nevala-Lee, The New York Times Book Review
Absolution opens decades before Area X forms, with a science expedition whose mysterious end suggests terrifying consequences for the future—and marks the Forgotten Coast as a high-priority area of interest for Central, the shadowy government agency responsible for monitoring extraordinary threats.

Many years later, the Forgotten Coast files wind up in the hands of a Central operative known as Old Jim. He starts pulling a thread that reveals a long and troubling record of government agents meddling with forces they clearly cannot comprehend. Soon, Old Jim is back out in the field, grappling with personal demons, now partnered with an unproven young agent, the two of them tasked with solving an unsolvable mystery. With every turn, the stakes get higher: Central agents are being liquidated by an unknown rogue entity and Old Jim’s life is on the line.

Old Jim’s investigation culminates in the first Central expedition into what has now been labeled Area X. A border has come down, and a full team has been assembled to find Area X’s “off switch” somewhere in the volatile, dangerous terrain that has defied all attempts to be explored, mapped, or controlled. A landscape that, one way or another, seems to consume all who enter it.

Sweeping and rich with ideas, iconic characters, and unpredictable adventure, Absolution converges in terrifying, ecstatic, and mind-bending ways. It is the final word on one of the most provocative and popular speculative fiction series of our time.
 
Contributor Bio(s)
 
Jeff VanderMeer is the author of Hummingbird Salamander; the Borne novels (Borne, The Strange Bird, and Dead Astronauts); and the Southern Reach series (Annihilation, Authority, Acceptance, and Absolution), the first volume of which won the Nebula Award and the Shirley Jackson Award and was adapted into a movie by Alex Garland. He has spoken at MIT, Columbia, Yale, and Vanderbilt, and gave the 2024 John Hersey Memorial Address at the Key West Literary Seminar. Environmental nonfiction by VanderMeer has appeared in Time, The Nation, and Esquire, among other publications. VanderMeer founded the Sunshine State Biodiversity Group nonprofit in 2023.