Eden

Rating: 8.5/10

Thanks to the publisher and author for an advance copy of Eden for review consideration. This did not influence my thoughts or opinions.

Eden is a hauntingly beautiful look at nature’s reclamation from man and the lengths it’ll take to protect it. Lebbon has crafted a top-notch eco-thriller that is destined for the big screen.

This was my first go at a full-length novel from the author, so I was pretty naive going in. I’d seen the Netflix adaptation of his novel, The Silence, a little while back and also had a chance to chat with the author on my podcast a couple of months ago, so I decided to give it a go and see if all of these rave author blurbs held up.

Well, they did.

While I found myself stumbling a bit in the beginning (say the first quarter or so) while we are being introduced to the characters, their reasoning behind traveling to Eden in the first place, and what they hoped to achieve by crossing it, it is all relevant to set up the rest of the novel. Oh boy, I did not expect to absolutely DEVOUR the last 75% of this novel in a matter of a couple hours. Lebbon’s writing accelerates off the page; we are talking from a brisk walk to full on sprint in the matter of pages once our adventurers find themselves deep within this Virgin Zone. Things that go bump in the night tend to have teeth, and they are typically razor sharp.

The characters themselves were fairly engaging, though a majority of them were there for the intent of fluff and dramatics. The main focus sat with Dylan and his daughter, Jenn, and their reason for traveling into Eden. The constant fight they put up to survive and find what they were looking for was so engaging and heart-breaking; I don’t see how you could be unmoved by their story. Mixed in with the groups’ story are glimpses into a parallel story of a woman named Kat, who we come to find out is Jenn’s mother, which I felt added a very ominous tone to the narrative but didn’t ultimately add a ton to the story.

The real reason I enjoyed this novel so immensely was how gorgeously displayed Eden was. The author’s ability to bring Eden to life and let it entangle the reader in its vines was absolutely breath-taking. It is a stunning world to bring these characters into, and while they fell for its innocent beauty just like I did, the darkness it hides may be even more tantalizing.

All in all, even with a bit of a trip at the beginning, Eden turned into a fantastic read with a photo finish. Perfect for fans of Jeff VanderMeer’s Southern Reach Trilogy. Can’t recommend it enough.

Tim Lebbon is in top form with this fast-paced eco-horror novel that sees a group of adventurers fighting nature - literally - after heading into a remote nature reserve (or Virgin Zone) known as Eden.
While not the first book to tackle the 'nature fights back' theme, it's one of the best examples of the genre - with an action packed narrative and some chilling threats of the flora and fauna variety.
Lebbon shows an apt touch at writing action sequences, while his horror roots are on full show as the group begin to meet their demise.
Given the coronavirus lockdown across nations - and with parks and reserves shut in many places - it's not hard to imagine nature seeking to reclaim its place - making this a timely and even more chilling release.

In a time unprecedented (even by the conspiracy theorists) a book that actually made me feel even worse about my life and the world I live in, thank you sir

Since the 1990s Tim Lebbon was been one of the most prolific writers of dark fiction, comfortably moving between fantasy, science fiction and horror and it was great to see his outstanding 2015 novel The Silence recently adapted into a decent Netflix film. His back-catalogue is huge, ranging from film novelisations, others connected to franchises, but his best are those when he runs with his own ideas and stories, with Echo City being a personal favourite. Lebbon maintains that high standard with his latest work, Eden, which again blends genres, this time with a strong environmental theme backing up a very entertaining survival story.

These days there are many eco-thrillers on the market and it is can be very easy to fall into the trap of writing yet another novel about global warming, rising tides and temperatures, with the end result being neither fresh or original. Although Eden falls into this literary ballpark, Lebbon wisely avoids these pitfalls by giving us very little background information, forcing the reader to join many of the rather enticing dots. All we know is that it is set sometime in the near future where mankind does indeed suffer from these types of problems, but the story does not dwell on them in the slightest. Every chapter has a very clever (and insightful) quote or anecdote which helps paint the bigger picture, from organisations such as United Zone Council and the Green World Alliance, in addition there are quotes from bloggers, soldiers and anonymous sources. All of which, combined, at the start of every chapter drip feed to the reader information about the troubled current state of the world.

The action opens with a group of adventurers about to enter Eden, which is one of thirteen Virgin Zones which have been created across the world to allow nature to thrive and regroup. People have not been allowed to enter any of these massive thirteen Zones for over fifty years, although adventurers are frequently smuggled into them to either steal wildlife, get their kicks or break a travel record set by a rival extreme-sport group. The Zones are guarded by soldiers who use deadly force to defend them from infiltrators. In these areas everything has been totally reclaimed by nature, which thrives without the interference of mankind, with many of the population itching for a look at one of these mysterious locations.

Eden is the oldest of the Virgin Zones and is trickiest to gain access to and travel across, amongst the secret world of thrill-seeking conquering Eden would be the equivalent of climbing Mount Everest back in the 1950s. Dylan leads a team of adventurers into Eden and intends to cross it with the minimum of equipment, before being met at the other side and smuggled out to safety with bragging rights in the adventure community. Surprise, surprise, things do not go to plan and there is something very nasty in the forest.

Once the novel started to move through the gears, I began to find myself marvelling at the descriptions of the wildlife, the forests and especially the remnants of mankind which has been completely reclaimed by nature in the passing fifty years. When I was a kid in the mid-1980s, in the north of Scotland, we lived close to a ruined mansion called Lessendrum House, which had a rarely used road leading to it and was off the beaten track. At some point this road fell into disuse and when my family revisited five years ago whilst on holiday, you would never have known there was ever a road in the first place, and the house itself was unrecognisable from three decades earlier. So, Tim Lebbon calls it correct, in fifty years nature would reclaim everything as it does in Eden.

This was a beautifully described book, which was perfected paced, even though it took its time getting going, allow yourself to be swept along into the atmospheric and eventually threatening location. Written in the third person, Dylan is the senior member of the group, accompanied by his partner Selina, daughter Jenn and the remainder of the group Cove, Aaron, and Lucy. Although they are all nice enough characters, many of which have their own motives, you might not cry too much as their number’s dwindle. Some readers might think they have it coming as nature takes its revenge. However, Lebbon also does a fine job of painting a picture of why these guys are into this type of ‘extreme’ past-time, even if it is misguided.

You could argue that much of this novel is speculative rather than science fiction, as perhaps in the future locations such as this might really exist. Although there is something nasty out there, in many ways, nature is the true beast and there are some excellent action sequences in the final third which are well worth waiting for with nature the true threat. The build-up is equally intense, it reminded me slightly of the 1980s action classic Predator, where the soldiers were aware of the camouflaged creature, when they could feel it was there, but could not see it. This book tapped into the same type of primeval fear.

Eden was an easy book to get sucked into and before long the atmosphere is so thick you will be hearing the cockatoos squawking in the night as you are dragged into this threatening Virgin Zone. This was an intelligent genre-bending story which did not overdo the supernatural elements and finely balanced this with the power of nature and the respect it needs to be given. Recommended.