Veniss Underground
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- £4.99
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- £4.99
Publisher Description
From the author of Annihilation, now a major motion picture on Netflix
Dreams and nightmares entwine as three fellow travellers strive to achieve their deepest desires.
Nicholas seeks to escape his demons in the city of Veniss’ shadowy underground. But in so doing, he makes a deal with the devil himself. His twin sister, Nicola, embarks on a feverish search for him. And while discovering the city’s hidden secrets, she’ll spin her own hypnotic tale.
Nicola’s lover Shadrach is haunted by her mysterious disappearance. In the grip of despair, he decides to embark on a mythic journey. Shadrach must steel himself to visit the nightmarish levels deep beneath the surface of the city to bring his love back to the light. For these depths hold perils that are both complex and chilling. There, he will find wonders beyond imagining . . . and horrors greater than the heart can bear.
Literary alchemist Jeff VanderMeer has produced a triumph of the imagination, revealing the mysterious city of Veniss through three intertwined voices. Veniss Underground is an unforgettable journey exploring the limits of love, memory and obsession. This edition includes the novella Balzac's War.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
HIn his masterful first novel, VanderMeer (City of Saints & Madmen) sets a dark, phantasmagoric tale in and beneath a decadent, far-future city where Living Artists craft monstrous works of biological art and genetically enhanced meerkats plot to make humanity obsolete. The story is told from three viewpoints, that of Nicholas, a Living Artist not quite talented enough to succeed; his more pragmatic, vat-grown twin sister, Nicola; and her former lover, the unsavory Shadrach, who has survived a childhood lived in the dangerous levels beneath the city and now operates above ground as an agent for Quin, the world's greatest Living Artist and the perverted master of much that is evil within the city of Veniss. When Nicholas's apartment is robbed and the tools of his trade are stolen, he goes to Shadrach and begs an introduction to Quin, hoping to find employment and resurrect his near moribund career. Alas, he fails to follow Shadrach's directions and soon disappears beneath the city, where he undergoes a wonder-filled journey that echoes Dante's Divine Comedy, the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice and the landscapes of Hieronymus Bosch, while also paying homage to the work of such genre masters as Cordwainer Smith and Edward Whittemore. VanderMeer's eye for just the right gruesome detail brings his nightmarish landscapes and bizarre, partially human creatures alive in astonishing profusion. Not for the faint of heart, the story packs a strong emotional wallop. (Apr. 4)
