How does mankind fight an enemy that eradicates all knowledge of itself? Or win a war you can’t remember you’re fighting? Welcome to the Antimemetics Division! This is your first day.
The first thing to know is that There Is No Antimemetics Division leans into hard sci-fi, but not in a way that feels stifling or boring. It’s kind of a mix of X-files...with more paperwork, cosmic horror, and weird timey wimey science. You're not going to understand some or even most of it because it’s intentionally written with plot holes and a loose narrative that barely holds itself together but still manages to come together in the end. You’ll probably get a little frustrated. But in the center of the chaos is one of the most interesting concepts I’ve found in a book in a very, very long time. Even if those concepts are always threatening to fall out of my grasp.
This is one of those books that's easy to lose yourself in. The horror seems vast and inescapable, pulling you into a mystery that’s impossible to walk away from—seriously, what the hell are these entities, and why does everyone seem to think it’s their first day? Once you start putting the pieces together, it’s too late. The threat is a lingering presence behind you, and there’s no escape.
For a book that’s not outright horror, I’m shocked by how much it managed to actually creep me out. The creatures in this are scary—not in a hideous creature feature kind of way, but in that palpable, holy-shit-this-would-be-terrifying-if-it-really-happened kind of way.
The last thing to know is that There Is No Antimemetics Division takes place in the broader SCP universe, but you don't have to know what that means to dive into this book. It's fun knowledge to have, but you can easily sink into that rabbit hole once you've finished. Get it here!