51 pages • 1 hour read
Jeff VanderMeerAuthority: A Novel
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2014A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Part 2, Chapters 015-018Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 2: “Rites”
Part 2, Chapter 015 Summary: “Seventh Breach”
Control tries to gather information about the director’s trip by herself before one of the 11th expeditions from Cheney and Lowry, the only man who returned alive from the first expedition. Lowry still works at the Southern Reach and is considered a hero and an anomaly, since he escaped both Area X and the cancer that killed other survivors of the expeditions. Cheney tells him that the director and Lowry did not get along that well but respected each other. They wonder why the director went into Area X alone.
Control works late that night going through the prior director’s notes. He finds the words she used as hypnosis commands. As a psychologist, she would have used these terms to get the others through the border calmly, but Control remembers that the biologist said hypnosis does not work on her.
Needing a break, he leaves his office for a stretch and hears noises from a nearby door. He enters the janitor’s closet to find Whitby, looking scared and confused. Control asks if he is okay since he appears to be having a breakdown. Whitby never used the Southern Reach’s mental health services, according to his files, but Control wonders if he needs them. Whitby says he is fine, collecting himself and talking about theories of Area X. Lately, he’s been thinking about multiple universes and split possibilities. He thinks they deciphered the unknowns of Area X in other timelines: “Some of these universes where we solved the mystery may be separated from ours by the thinnest of membranes, the most insignificant of variations. [...] What mundane detail aren’t we seeing, or what things are we doing that lead us away from the answer” (181). Control tries to maintain Whitby’s dignity by ignoring his apparent mental instability. He leaves him alone.
The Voice calls, and this time he appreciates Control’s updates. The Voice tells him not to get paralyzed and to just do his job. Control wonders if he is stabilized in his new role yet.
Part 2, Chapter 016 Summary: “Terroirs”
The next morning, Control sits through an hour of the videotapes of the first expedition. Since the footage is off-putting, they only allow people to view it for an hour at a time. Grace shows rare kindness by putting her hand on his shoulder and warning him the images are disturbing, then waits for him outside the door. Control watches the footage of the expeditioners hiking through Area X, an untamed wilderness. Lowry, who is the only survivor, is usually the recorder. He notices the lighthouse, tunnel, and other landmarks. The footage goes static multiple times. People go missing, others seem to lose their minds, and their entire language becomes strange and inhuman.
Later, the tape shows the expedition leader with a clone:
The woman on the left of the screen then stopped shouting and stared into the camera. The woman on the right also stopped shouting and stared into the camera. An identical fear and pleading and confusion radiated from the masks of their faces toward him, from so far away, from so many years away (190).
Others off-camera are shouting and speaking, but their words are not clear. Control is disturbed by this footage, wondering if and how Area X can create copies.
Afterward, Control talks to the biologist. He is out of sorts from the videotapes, and then the biologist is extra resistant to him. She screams multiple times that she is not the biologist. Control thinks they should continue their interview later since she is not thinking clearly. The biologist laughs that he is humoring her and that she cannot give him the information he wants because she is truly not the biologist. Control leaves her quickly.
Part 2, Chapter 017 Summary: “Perspective”
At lunch, Control, Cheney, Whitby, Jessica Hsyu, and Grace sit together. They discuss meetings, then Grace asks if they want to hear a story. Control agrees, and Grace tells the tale of a man in the domestic terrorism unit who was undercover with the militia. She explains how this man blew his cover by getting romantically involved with one of the militia leader’s girlfriends. She attacks Control with this long story, which he knows is about him. All the others at the table are uncomfortable, leaving one by one while Grace continues. Control jumps in to finish the story, not letting her take control. He explains how Rachel, the girlfriend, was soon found out for her disloyalty, but Control had already left the operation. Rachel was tortured, unaware she had had sex with a spy, and her boyfriend shot her. Control still feels guilty and regretful for his mistake, but it was his first mission. His mother covered for him, using her pull to get him other jobs, but he was never deployed in the field again.
Grace keeps firing his mistakes at him, as people in the cafeteria listen in. She uses up all the dirt she has on him, leaving Control disparaged and upset, but also relieved. Everyone knows his past now. Grace tells him he is a lot like them, someone who has made lots of mistakes and is trying to do better. Control knows her words imply he will never figure out Area X, and she will never accept him as a leader. Grace clings to the director being alive, though Control insists she is gone. Control excuses himself from their confrontation and vomits in the nearest bathroom.
Part 2, Chapter 018 Summary: “Recovery”
Control talks to The Voice, who is aggressive when Control asks for some answers. The Voice makes it clear he is in control, stating Control reports to him, not vice versa, but then he confirms the prior director did make a secret, unapproved trip into Area X. She was there for three weeks, then returned and was suspended for six months for her actions; Grace was put in charge during this time. They do not have any records of her three weeks in Area X, which frustrates Control. As usual, he feels disoriented while talking to The Voice.
Later that day, he interviews Ghost Bird outside by the pond. She is happy to be outside, breathing fresh air, even though they have guards surrounding them just in case she tries to flee. The two have a more open, friendly conversation, and Control thinks it is nice to see her outside, not caged up. When pressed, Ghost Bird quietly tells him again she is not the biologist; she promises she is being honest and feels there is something different in her she cannot understand—a brightness. Control says the brightness is called “life,” but she does not think so. They spend about half an hour outside by the pond, with her pointing out the animals and him trying to get more information without success. Control thinks if Ghost Bird has a brightness, he has a corresponding darkness.
Part 2, Chapters 015-018 Analysis
The theme of unknown forces continues as the central idea of the text, shown by multiple questions without answers—but readers are finally given some solutions. Many clues add up to larger reveals, such as Control watching the videotape and seeing the doppelgangers. By viewing this disturbing footage, Control cannot deny the objective truth that Area X creates copies of whoever enters its borders. Of course, readers still do not know how or why it makes mimics, but one of the many disorienting mysteries is coming together. Thus, when Ghost Bird keeps insisting she is not the biologist, Control (and readers) have an inkling she may be telling the truth: “‘I am not the biologist.’ [...] ‘You are not the biologist,’ he echoed. ‘You want the biologist. I’m not the biologist. Go talk to her, not me.’ Was this some kind of identity crisis or just metaphorical?” (195). Because of the creepy footage and Ghost Bird’s intense, insistent outburst about not being the biologist, some of the unknowns are loosely explained, and her real identity is foreshadowed. Though nothing is fully clarified or elucidated, the clues point to Ghost Bird being a copy of the biologist they sent in during the 12th expedition.
Despite some helpful reveals, the book still creates more questions than answers. For example, why is Whitby acting strangely and hiding in a closet alone? Is he mentally breaking down? Readers are also left wondering who ransacked Grace’s office. What is the “something bad” the biologist saw at the top of the lighthouse? What is Area X, and what does it want? How was Area X created? Why can’t Ghost Bird remember more? These inquiries, and many more, exist in the novel and start to consume Control, pushing him to stay late every night, thinking about the mysteries while he runs, and spending all his free time wondering and planning his work.
Grace, as the antagonist, also ramps up their conflict when she attacks Control in front of everyone in the cafeteria, which also exhibits more of Control’s backstory to round out his character. Her disdain, distrust, and hatred for Control rise, since she knows Central is blocking her work at Central and suspects he broke into her office. Since she is both holding out hope for Cynthia and grieving her loss, Grace attacks Control as an outlet. By sharing Control’s past mistakes, which ended with an innocent woman dying, Grace flaunts his poor track record, aiming to diminish him in other’s eyes. Her power move does not quite work, though, since Control takes over the conversation, admitting to his flaws and internally stating he feels guilty daily over the death of Rachel (the militia man’s girlfriend). Overall, this one scene builds characterization, conflict, internal thoughts, and backstory, and it provides yet another example of an attempt to exert control going awry.
The budding relationship between Ghost Bird and Control intensifies during their shared time outside, displaying themes of connection, control, and vulnerability. Ghost Bird acts more openly than she has before. Like a captive bird, she is allowed to fly for a short amount of time, thanks to Control pulling strings: “‘I can only give you thirty or forty minutes,’ he said. Bringing her here felt now like a terrible indulgence […] But he also knew he couldn’t have left things as they were after the morning session” (219). Though they are outside, they are still monitored by men with guns as they travel around the pond, showing the overarching influence of Bureaucracy and Control. Displaying his care, Control thinks how cruel it was to keep her caged in when her biologist mind relates to nature very well. Despite their growing kindness and affection for each other, Control also pushes her into reality: “Soon you’ll need to be candid about what you remember and what you don’t remember. They’ll take you away from here if I don’t get results. And I’ll have no say in where they send you if that happens. It might be worse than here, a lot worse” (221). His admission shows again that he cares about her, finally allowing his personal borders to come down and let others inside his heart. He does not want her to go, showing empathy and attachment to her, even though he knows better than to build a relationship with the subject of his interviews.
Further, the trope of opposites attract and the uncanny is portrayed when Ghost Bird states she has a “brightness” inside her: “‘I’m trying to be honest. I’m not her…and there’s something inside of me I don’t understand. There’s a kind of…brightness…inside.’” (221). Her insistence that she is not the biologist should be seen as an admission of truth by this point since she is honest with Control. The new clue about her “brightness” is an homage to the first book (since the brightness spores the biologist swallowed made her immune to Area X and hypnosis). Control does not understand her meaning, but his thought about being her corresponding darkness, the equilibrium to her brightness, implies he believes that contrasting elements are magnetized. Due to this bonding scene, the idea arises that these characters can complete each other.
