Hummingbird Salamander, by Jeff Vandermeer
3.0 Stars
5-26-2022

A Lesser Vandermeer. This is Vandermeer trying his hand at writing a (eco-doomer) thriller, like Lev Grossman did with Codex. And like Codex, it turns out that the task is harder than it seems. The first problem that comes up is motivation, as in why is the main character doing any of this. Our protagonist is a middle aged tech professional, and it is super unclear why she continues pursuing the mystery past the first time she gets threatened. Maybe I'm just unusually cowardly, but if someone was staking my family out and running over my co-workers with SUVs, my reaction would be "ok, sure, calm down guys, I don't actually care about this ARG that much. Here, would you like to buy this super-valuable hummingbird off of me for $100K? great thanks." So for at least the first half of the book, the main character has zero reason to pursue the mystery outside of an idle curiosity, and a whole bunch of reasons to let the mystery drop. And I know, I know, the hummingbird was supposed to be this affecting symbol to her, awakening her to new truths, but I just did not buy it. If the protagonist has ignored the world and all such symbols for 35 years, the likely result is that she continues ignoring such things in her 36th year. As usual, I hoped that the bad plotting was intentional and had a material basis that would be explained later on, as in On My Way to Paradise (or now that I think of it, as in Annihilation). Nope!

The next problem is affect, i.e. why is the main character so very down all the time? Rough childhood, sure, but all the same it's been 20 years & you are a upper middle class software manager, maybe chill a bit & enjoy your family & your mountain home? Also, you must be a joy to work with. Also, why is your software job so serious, i.e. so Glengarry Glenross? Every tech job I have been in has had, at the worst, ultra-nerdy people being passive-aggressively petty about comically minor shit. There's none of this direct rudeness or physical intimidation or threats, that is a one-way ticket to HR. So the character and her job did not read true. Next comes caring, as in why do I care about the detailed history of these people she is investigating & trying to untangle? I don't, and doubly so in the context of the larger issues going on in the world. Next comes revelation. Vandermeer loves to do a series of reveals and rugpulls, but in this story they turn out to be, for the most part, some extremely small beer.

Finally though comes the good parts. It's a fast read! Once I got into the book, I downed it in a single sitting. Vandermeer is just an enjoyable guy to read, and while he doesn't always hit the mark he does have occasional passages of lyric beauty or genuine surprise. Overall I did like the ecology doomerism, and I did like the overlap of themes between this and Annihilation, i.e. of the line between us and Nature, of brightness, of change and changed understanding. Oh and I liked the mid-book Riven Tower energy that was going on. So despite all issues with the thriller, I wouldn't exactly call it *bad* like Codex was, just a bit of a structural misfire.