Another unique and trippy ride from VanderMeer. The story is so unusual that you can't help but be swept up in it and wonder what will happen next. There is no predictable in a VanderMeer book. Some of the best speculative fiction that is currently being written.

Excellent and completely original. This sci-fi thriller is an excellent first purchase for most public fiction collections, particularly where genre-crossing titles are popular.

I'm just saying it up-front: This is an uncomfortable review to write, because I SO want to like this book. But, I have to give it 2.5 (maybe 3) stars.

I fell in love with the Borne books by VanderMeer. His style of writing thoughts, not sentences, and impressions (not flowing story) worked in Borne. Because the Borne entity (probably) wasn't human. But it had emotion, and discovered purpose despite a story that only emerged as you wrestled it out of the snippets you were given. And then the Southern Reach trilogy pulled me in with story. A suspenseful, character-filled series of moments that pulled me along. Plus, the environmental apocalyptic visions were things I could let my mind happily absorb.

Plus, VanderMeer writes what I imagine is literary awesomeness. People who know literature can probably tell you all the amazing things he is doing in crafting a book. It just feels like you're reading "important literature".

So I had such high hopes for reading Hummingbird Salamander. And, ugh - I just didn't love it.

Maybe it's me. Maybe I was reading it as I went to bed, and during the holiday 2020 season when I did so, there was too-much wine, too-much food, too-late nights, and I just fell asleep from those things.

But, then when I tried to read it in the day, I found myself dozing off. Wait - this shouldn't be happening. VanderMeer is a GREAT writer. This MUST be an awesome book.

But, I couldn't escape the problems. On reflection, what were these things that keeps me from plowing thru, then gushing about the book? Maybe it's because after an exciting opening, the middle part of the story just Took. So. Long. to develop. And it wasn't interesting along the way.

Maybe it was because this is one of those books where progenitor keeps stumbling from one bad decision to the next. These kind of books frustrate me; even when the characters know they're doing it and tell us they're making bad decisions. They still make me want to stop encountering them doing it.

Maybe it was because I just didn't end up caring about the main character. She is broken, possessed of the need to follow an idea of something to its conclusion at the expense of everything else. Though this theme is one that ought to be able to pull you in, this character didn't do so. I just couldn't go on her journey with her.

And the typical environmental apocalypse that tugs at you in VanderMeer's books was present, but was not the level of character in the book that it is in the others mentioned above.

The writing is definitely that VanderMeer artsy style. Quick thoughts. Sometimes a full sentence. With guns. People might matter. Or a pocketbook might represent. It isn't clear why. Maybe this means something to me, but should it? What would the pond do? (He's clearly better at that then me 😂)

At the end, it finally gets interesting in the last 20% of the book. The story starts to pick up pace. The characters start to move more quickly as they encounter the ends of their stories. I was able to get thru that last section without stopping. AWESOME.

But, did it rescue the rest of the book? I'm sorry, but no. While I can recommend Borne to pretty much anyone who is willing to read some bit of SciFi, I simply can't recommend this book to others.

Given my rating scale (below), this fits between 2 and 4. It makes me sad that a favorite author of mine didn't wow me with a book. So, it's 2-stars sad. But, I think it must be written in a manner literary critics will love. It's the kind of book that makes me think "Wow, it sounds like people who know what good literature is would LOVE this writing." So, that would be a 4 (if true).

But in the end, the fact that the book didn't pull me in, and make me want to stay up all night reading it, means this tends more towards the 2.5-3 star category.

Sadly. I really, truly, honestly wish it were otherwise. I really want to like everything Jeff writes.

(Rating scale: 5 stars for "best books ever". 4 stars for well-written books you won't read again. 3 stars is you forget the book the moment you finish. 2 stars it's so bad it makes you sad. 1 star when you can't read past chapter 3.)

Well written with good character development but very confusing to me. I went into it with the mindset that annihilation was very mind trippy but I felt like for more than half the book I honestly had no idea what was going on and why the main character who is a detective I think felt like she was being followed and how that had to do with a pandemic. It was quite difficult to read, maybe it was just me. I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

Jeff VanderMeer has managed to craft his very unique, specific worldview onto a novel with some heft in modernity. His other books are absolutely beautiful but often tend to drift into hazes of mist, whereas Hummingbird Salamander never becomes a dream and is always vibrantly real. Loved it.

As a longtime fan of Jeff VanderMeer’s, I was very excited to read this book. This is a heart pounding eco-lit novel about a woman who goes by the name Jane who is handed an envelope by a stranger. Inside is a key along with an address and a number and an urgent message. Jane follows the clues, which lead her to a carboard box that houses a taxidermied rare hummingbird. It’s the start of a mystery Jane becomes obsessed with solving, even to the detriment of her own family. Who has led her to this preserved bird and why? There is so much to unpack in this novel including environmental issues, corporate corruption and eco-terrorism. This novel was a well-researched page turner and I ended up learning so much about the animals in this book. VanderMeer begs the question, how much are we individually culpable for the destruction of our planet? And how much can one person do to help save it? Thank you to Farrar, Straus & Giroux and to NetGalley for the advanced review copy of this books.

I’ve been wanting to read something by Jeff VanderMeer since I saw Annihilation, so I jumped at the chance to read an ARC of his newest book. I was expecting weird, ecological sci-fi with some possible body horror elements. It’s definitely ecological and weird, but it’s only sci-fi in the sense that it takes place during a fictional pandemic during a time when climate change has finally kickstarted the end of the world, but that stuff is kind of in the background of a sort of murder mystery where an ex-bodybuilder who works at a security company is trying to figure out why an ecoterrorist left her a taxidermy hummingbird. I did like it, but I honestly found it kind of hard to follow. It was hard to keep track of who was who because some characters have a few different things they’re referred to by, or seem to just kind of pop in out of nowhere as main antagonists. I even had to look up a couple of other reviews before I wrote this to refresh my memory about what even happened because I was so lost. It was also kind of slow and meandery. There’s something to it that kept me going, though. The mystery about the narrator’s past was really interesting, I liked her voice and it was overall pretty fun to read. I’d say it’s more of a 3.5, but I’ll bump it up to a 4 because I did enjoy it even though it wasn’t the easiest read. It was saved by its weirdness for sure. I do think a lot of people are going to like it.

Ridiculously thrilling. It’s the kind of book where you may not know what’s happening in any given moment, but you absolutely know that you need to keep reading.

#HummingbirdSalamander #MustReadSF2021
Okay. I have a love/hate with Jeff VanderMeer. I love his books, but I hate that they make me feel inferior. Once again Mr. VanderMeer has done this with Hummingbird Salamander. His brain works in such a way that I am fascinated and amazed with his storytelling. While at the same time confused and drained of all thought. Hummingbird Salamander is a vivid and clever book. When I read it my mind feels like a gallon of plain paint at Home Depot getting the vivid colors added to it. I am never disappointed in his material only my brain for lack of comprehension of it.
Once again thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan for the E-arc copy of Hummingbird Salamander by Jeff VanderMeer.

Absolutely terrific, even more so in its differences from what Jeff has done previously. My closest analogue is... if Ursula K. Le Guin and John le Carré did THE MONKEY WRENCH GANG(?) or something.

I read this for blurbing purposes early in December. This is the blurb I gave: A strange, seductive eco-thriller ripe for our era - Silvia Moreno-Garcia

Pretty good, I like that this is less weird and faster-paced than some of this other work. It contains his good imagination and innovative plot, and will satisfy many sci-fi fans.

I really appreciate the ARC for review!!

Without any pomp and circumstance in HUMMINGBIRD SALAMANDER, by Jeff VanderMeer, readers are thrust right into the story of "Jane Smith" who is led to a storage unit containing a taxidermized hummingbird. There is also a clue about a special salamander from a recently deceased enigmatic ecoterrorist named Silvina. As Jane begins to follow the clues and Silvina, a conspiracy that seems to have no limits unfolds and as Jane finds more clues, she becomes addicted to finding the treasured salamander and all the the truths that hide behind it.
VanderMeer takes the reader on quite journey with Jane and her quest to find the salamander and what happens next. The linear flow of the book becomes more muddled as it goes on, reflecting how Jane struggles with her purpose and desire for becomes more muddled. I believe it was a choice to keep the reader foggy as to who all of the players are in the conspiracy, but I found it tough to keep straight who is who and how they relate to each other. Its a fine line, because the frustrating emotion that comes from struggling to understand mirrors the main character, creating a emotional connection to the character, but for me that struggle was hard to work through at times, producing moments of disappointment that I couldn't figure it out. Other readers very well could have a different experience, but that was mine. VanderMeer has a gift for imagery and developing complex, flawed, and still beautiful characters. The last quarter or so of the book did keep me on the edge of my seat; I was physically excited to find out what happens to Jane and what she discovers.
HUMMINGBIRD SALAMANDER was written in a very deliberate style to illicit certain emotions and I was certainly emotionally affected by the book. A thriller, a study of personality evolution, and commentary on society's treatment of nature keeps this book interesting from beginning to end.

This story of a tech security company employee who is drawn into a complex environmentalist plot touches on themes VanderMeer has explored in the past. In some ways, this read to me like an inchoate version of a Southern Reach story, most similar to Authority. The unconventionality of the narrator's voice, in addition to too much distance from the conflict made this one tedious for me. Sentences are clipped, phrased in unexpected tenses, and rarely as lyrical as you find in Annihilation, Authority and Acceptance. The protagonist repeatedly addresses the reader and refers to some life-changing event that has forever altered her life, but with so little emotional investment in the character and her family, it's hard to care about the implications. That ambiguity amplifies the lack of cohesion in the mounting tension, and at almost 200 pages in, I realized I was supposed to be very concerned for the protagonist as she begins to suffer the consequences for her private investigation, when I was decidedly not. I was unable to finish this book, but there were glimmers of the poetry VanderMeer has proven so capable of in other stories.


Thank you to NetGalley and Farrar, Straus and Giroux for the ARC.

This book was quite interesting, but it didn't quite get there for me. I found the story had a bunch of elements that I thought I was going to like, but the whole story didn't hang together well for me. That's not to say the story isn't good. It just wasn't for me. I really liked the name of the purse (Shovel Pig is an amazing name), and I thought the themes and the narrator's angle were intriguing. It just didn't hit home for me as well as it could have.

Cryptic, claustrophobic, complex, confusing! So many C words can be used to define this rich, fresh, stunning mysterious story dances between dystopian sci-fi, thought provoking suspense and ecological mystery!

We patiently learn to walk in the dark as the author gives us small hints about the MC’s motivation to find the mystery behind a dead woman: Silvina: a troubled ecoterrorist and daughter of Argentine industrialist. She leaves a key to a storage unit. As our MC turns the key she finds taxidermied hummingbird and a few clues that leads her to a taxidermied salamander. I know your mind is already confused. Why this woman is dead and why the hell she left those suspicious belongings to the MC! It’s weird!

But as you start to learn about unconventional MC named Jane Smith, you feel like you find someone closer to your weirdest family member you politely reject to have communication more than two seconds ( she is between your big mouthed aunt and wanker uncle) It’s not about her threatening appearance (once upon a time she was wrestler ) or naming her bag “shovel pig” ( I call my PC: Shirley even though she tells me not to call her like that! She hates Airplane quotes! ) She’s tough, menacing but she’s also rude, relentless ! She doesn’t care people’s thoughts! She acts reserved around her own family. Sometimes she has hard time to draw lines between being tough and being douche!

But I liked the way the author wants us walk in the dark, chasing more information about the big scheme. Questions fly above your heads. You get dizzier, dumbfounded, shocked but you keep guessing more and try to gather the pieces to see the picture. Pacing was absolutely satisfying. You keep reading even though at each chapter your brain turns into a mush, your hair is in the air, you lose the rest of your frying brain cells , you smell the smoke coming out of your ears!

Yes, this is compelling, exhausting reading but it’s truly worth it because there is no missing piece or unanswered question, a plot hole left in the end. You get your answers and close your book with big satisfying smile!

This book is not masterpiece as like Annihilation but it’s so close to be a masterpiece! It’s ultra smart, exciting, moving, absurd, dark, mind bending , earth shattering, strange, difficult but it truly gives you delight of well written literature! I loved it! I truly recommend to the fans of genre and the author!

He has a unique brain which is capable to create unconventional, original , fantastic stories nobody ever dare to think !

Many thanks to NetGalley and Farrar, Straus and Giroux / MCD for sharing this special reviewer copy with me in exchange my honest thoughts.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I discovered Jeff VanderMeer through the novel Finch when I was looking for detective novels that mashup genres. I have been a big fan ever since and Borne was one of my favorite books last year.

When I read the synopsis of Hummingbird Salander I was excited to see him return to the detective genre - sort of. Although this is a mystery/detective novel of sorts it is definitely VanderMeer style where just solving the mystery is not the real focus.

For me the novel is really about obsession. Jane receives a strange letter and a key in an envelope from her local coffee shop and in the process of investigating it, completely loses herself in the process. She ignores her family, her job, her health and becomes solely focused on unpacking and following the layers of secrets hidden in the origins of the letter and where it leads. Her life becomes summarized by this quote:

"Let the mystery alone, did not tug on the string of it. But, all the while, the string was tugging at me"

Through flashbacks and a slow descent, Jane travels through taxidermy, wildlife preservation, eco terrorism and multiple versions of paranoia from a whole cast of characters to resolve things - but at what cost?

The first half of the book was faster paced and more straightforward than the second half, but it never really sagged and I was definitely engaged throughout. The ending definitely took some strange unexpected twists and was very much a "VanderMeer style" of resolution.

Highly recommended for VanderMeer fans and mystery/detective novel fans that want a fresh change from straightforward whodunit plots.

Actual rating: 3.5 stars.

Those of you expecting something like Annihilation (VanderMeer's most well-known, and in my humble opinion, best book): prepare for disappointment. In the context of VanderMeer's work, this is closer to Borne, but slightly less weird, faster paced, and more confusing.

The main character's purse has a name (?), and that name is "Shovel Pig" (???). I think that one fact says a lot about this book as a whole: it's weird, and characters just do things for no understandable reason.

The main character, "Jane," is an asshole. She's not merely "difficult," or "complicated," or "blunt": she's an asshole, there's no other way of saying it. She treats everyone—family, coworkers, random strangers—like absolute garbage. Unlikeable characters aren't inherently bad in fiction, except she's the type of asshole who is impossible to empathize with, sympathize with, or root for, which makes for a challenging reading experience.

Even worse, her motivation for tracking down Silvina is completely unclear for the first two-thirds of the book, and when it does come into focus it's extremely underwhelming and dubious, particularly given all Jane sacrifices in her quest to…find Silvina, or whatever her goal is. In short, the provided explanation is too little, too late.

This is symptomatic of a greater problem, which is that the events in this book carry almost no emotional impact because everything is so confusing. I spent most of the book trying to figure out why I should care: about Silvina; about the pages and pages and pages spent detailing Jane's seemingly irrelevant backstory; about the overbearing preaching on environmentalism (kind of expected but still not appreciated) and the surveillance state (neither expected nor appreciated); about whatever it is that Jane is trying to accomplish; about who all these random people are and why they're trying to kill each other.

Lest this be an entirely negative review, let me also share some of the things I liked, which kept this from getting a one-star rating. The core mystery is interesting, and at least things were actually happening: all told, it was a quick read, even if only a few sections were truly suspenseful. The writing itself is decent, though if you're expecting the gorgeous, hypnotic prose of Annihilation you'll be sorely disappointed (there were a number of errors in my ebook, but I assume that's because it's an advanced copy and that those typos will be fixed by the time of publishing). Moreover, one could not accuse VanderMeer of cliché: everything about this book is fresh, from plot to characters to settings that felt original and occasionally exceptionally interesting. Finally, I'm most happy that the main questions were neatly wrapped up by the end, even if it did end on a bit of a cliffhanger.

Jeff VanderMeer continues to move science fiction in bold new directions, and brings a literary and abstract flair to his work. In Hummingbird Salamander, VanderMeer weaves in elements of suspense, along with tropes of detective fiction, to combine in a swirl of commentary on events that are very current. VanderMeer demonstrates a skill for doing what science fiction affords -- holding up a funhouse mirror.

Hummingbird Salamander is a gripping read that is well-written and takes us to new places.

hmm i think this book will take a while to sink in for me! i really liked where it went in the last third, but it took a while to pull me in. i don’t think i /really/ can ever dislike anything by jeff vandermeer, though.

- Nirica from team Champaca