Authority (Southern Reach, #2)
by Jeff Vandermeer
Annoying, doesn't quite jell, doesn't stand alone as a story.
Control sucks---obviously, I guess. In Annihilation, the Biologist is trying hard to be a human in relationship to other humans and falling short, sometimes in cringeworthy ways, but it's a more interesting quest. (To me?) Control's also working hard, but to prove himself, compete over everything and defeat everyone, whether they challenged him or not. He interprets everything as a challenge directed at him, personally. And while that kind of story can be fun in its own way, I suspect those kind of stories usually have a lot of explosions and silly car chases for a reason. Control's inner life is boring and depressing, and I guess that would be more forgivable if his moments of not-being-able-to-see-himself-clearly were more interesting. His dumb crush on the Biologist ("I'm definitely 100% not getting emotionally involved with her, nope!") is just rote misogyny. Thanks for reminding us you're a heterosexual man and having intense but shallow conversations with a woman while you're feeling isolated and attacked means that you get to turn her into your manic pixie dream girl!
But it was very readable and the plot was often pretty interesting, and I do want to read #3.