Authority

The second book in this series takes place outside of Area X, and revolves around the Southern Reach command, who are basically the authorities in charge of working out what Area X is and what to do about it. We start to get some answers here. Certainly we learn more about some of the members of the last mission to Area X.

This book does a good job of building from the last book. There are some questions answered, and still many more to be answered, but that is okay. It is the nature of this trilogy that we really only know what the characters know, and they don't have the answers either. But we get to go along with them on a journey to uncover more, and as they find out, so do we.