Borne (Borne, #1)

by Jeff VanderMeer

for a moment there was no ruined city around me, no search for food and water, no roving gangs and escaped, altered creatures of unknown origin or intent. No mutilated, burned bodies dangling from broken streetlamps.

Perhaps he was trying to forget the details of some personal failure he could not forgive, something he’d brought on himself or actions he’d taken toward the end.

Maybe Mord was his idea, or he'd been pivotal to what Mord eventually became?

I still have vague memories of the camps. The ever-present mud churned to muck by overcrowding, of mosquitoes so thick you had to keep your mouth shut,

Why not swallow them? Nutritious, maybe?

But would you make a wolf feel guilty for killing its prey? Would you make an eagle feel guilty for flying?

Across half the surface of the larger pond, a leaking of blood like a sightless eye,

What does that mean???

We had lost the Balcony Cliffs.

One of the weakest parts of the story.

“I doubt you’re a weapon,” I said, drowsy. “You’re too silly to be a weapon.” “A weapon can’t be silly?” “No,” I confirmed. When I thought about it later, I realized most weapons were silly or silly-looking, just in a different way.

I'm having trouble imagining silly-looking weapons.

They had taken away our ability to govern ourselves.

If this is an allegorical tale, I'm not getting it.