Terror stalks the pages of this arctic ecological horror novel.
When Leandro Grass, an affluent if mysterious client, approaches Mark Steiner and Rob Granek about a trek to the North Pole, they should be delighted. As business partners and extreme guides, they have dreamed of an expedition to Antarctica for years. The cash Grass is putting down on his jaunt would set them up for that.
But Mark has just been through a soul-wrenching separation and none of his previous goals spark the same enthusiasm they used to. Still, a job is a job, and if Grass’s team is prepped and ready, Mark and Rob will guide them.
However, there are far more pieces moving on this particular expedition than either of them realized. Grass’s two meat-headed companions seem like trouble before they even set out. Katherine Kendrick, Grass’s partner in both business and pleasure, brings back too many unwelcome reminders of Mark’s soulmate, Misaki. It’s becoming increasingly clear that Grass has a shady goal in the trip they are taking. One that he is not above sacrificing the people around him to.
Added to that, their team is not the only one making this trek with something more in mind. As they get closer to their destination, it is obvious that there is something larger than all of them, pulling strings to make sure they never reach it. Something that seems to be able to creep inside Mark and Rob’s brains and turn their every fear against them.
Polaris is part psychological horror, part elemental survival, and part historical mystery. It fuses together a range of themes to create a unique action thriller. There’s a surrealist feeling to the story where not everything makes sense. The focus is more on the overall emotional turmoil than the specifics.
It’s clear from the opening pages that Kamiński knows this bleak and unforgiving setting. The description of wind, shifting ice, the scent of unwashed bodies in cramped tents, all of this builds the stage for a terse and atmospheric journey. Polaris really digs into the isolation and fear of an uninhabitable terrain.
The insidious nature of the horror that Mark and Rob experience is when the story is at its most gripping. It’s a slowly building seemingly eldritch being that attacks them from the inside out in such a way that they can’t quite decide whether it’s psychological or supernatural. The further they get from civilization, the deeper they’re sucked into the grasp of whatever force is assailing them. The fact that the people these explorers are guiding are also becoming more unravelled the further they go only adds to the tension.
While the setting and adventure are gripping, the narrative structure of Polaris feels unbalanced. So much time and space is devoted to prepping for the trek to the North Pole and Mark’s day-to-day life without much time left for unravelling the mystery of what the other characters’ motives and goals are. Certain characters are introduced late and unpacked very little despite being integral to the main plotline, and some major mysteries are explained from one person to another over a single scene. The breadcrumbs that should have been scattered through the earlier, slower part of the story end up clogging up the finale and disrupting the carefully built tension.
Polaris is a terse, atmospheric ode to the world and every strange thing that lives within it. It’s a tense, uneasy ride that doesn’t quite unravel all its mysteries but is no lesser for keeping a few things to itself. The beautifully rendered, distinctive setting is reason enough to give this one a go, but the psychological and uncanny elements also pack a punch.
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