Hardcover, 272 pages
English language
Published Nov. 11, 2025 by Ballantine Books.
I'm a huge fan eldritch/cosmic horror and abstract threats, and this book delivered. Think things can't get any stranger or more existentially dangerous as you're reading? WRONG. The stakes keep rising and rising all the way through; never a dull moment!
Ngl this got so convoluted I kinda checked out halfway through. The power creep of the threats is just kinda like.., yeah I mean how do u deal with a world ending congnitohazard that has eaten all of humanity? I found the less threatening scps way more fun to think about. Also it has the classic horror thing of the monster not being scary once you show it. Especially when the threat is a literal CONCEPT, whyyyy are u making me think of a white guy in his 20s?
The book is really well written, the dialogue is good, easily leagues above most SCP writings (which is yknow. Why this is published and most of the stuff is on the archive or Reddit or whatever). The concept of the book is by its very nature impossible to understand, and trying to put it into words is a cool attempt, but …
Ngl this got so convoluted I kinda checked out halfway through. The power creep of the threats is just kinda like.., yeah I mean how do u deal with a world ending congnitohazard that has eaten all of humanity? I found the less threatening scps way more fun to think about. Also it has the classic horror thing of the monster not being scary once you show it. Especially when the threat is a literal CONCEPT, whyyyy are u making me think of a white guy in his 20s?
The book is really well written, the dialogue is good, easily leagues above most SCP writings (which is yknow. Why this is published and most of the stuff is on the archive or Reddit or whatever). The concept of the book is by its very nature impossible to understand, and trying to put it into words is a cool attempt, but it gets kinda tired. Once we switched to Adam’s pov I didn’t really care. Would’ve read an entire book of Nema’s pov tho!!
Anyway these are my only critiques because beyond that it’s pretty cool. I’d say more adventure than horror bc again, once you’ve seen the monster it’s not that scary, so if ur into that kinda thing it’s probably great, just not quite my thing. 3.5 stars rounded up to 4
Gedanken zu folgen, die zu denken gemäß ihrer Definition sich der Existenz widersetzen, ist überraschend erhellend. Gibt es Werke darum bemüht die Welt aufklärerisch als reinen Widerstreit der Interessen zu verstehen, so abstrahiert dieses das Verständnis noch auf die Ebene der Ideen als Akteure an sich. Wie bei Science Fiction üblich lebt das Werk allein von der Idee von den Ideen mehr als Charakteren - wenn mich die Erinnerung nicht trügt erinnere ich mich ihrer kaum - und so ist es letztendlich auch schwer dem Werk anzulasten, dass sich verfasst durch einen menschlichen Autor keine nicht-menschlichen Gedanken fanden der Idee ein nicht-triviales gar undenkbares Ende zu bescheren. Dieses Buch zu lesen bleibt dennoch eine gute Idee.
A fun and short SF book that takes an idea, toys with it some, and then wraps it up without going on too long.
