Station Eleven
Alright, I should have listened to everyone who told me not to read this book during a global pandemic. Why? Because Station Eleven is about the aftermath of a flu-like disease that sweeps the world and kills off most the population. You know, light fun quarantine reading!
The world’s current situation aside, Emily St. John Mandel’s Station Eleven is a masterfully told dystopian tale. Set twenty years post-pandemic, the story centers on Kirsten, a woman who travels through the ruins of civilization performing with the Traveling Symphony, a theater and music troupe (they only do Shakespeare). The night the pandemic hit, Kirsten was a child actor part of a production of King Lear, when actor Arthur Leander (playing Lear) dies of a heart attack on stage. The story stays focused in on the troupe as they travel, but also flashes back in time to a variety of characters in the “before” times.
When they come across one settlement that’s taken over by a violent cult leader, they quickly flee — but not before dramatic consequences. What scared/awed me reading this was 1) how close we could be to total collapse (LOL) and 2) how vivid a writer Emily St. John Mandel is. It’s more than just a dystopian/post-apocalyptic tale — it’s also a bit of a mystery, trying to understand how all the disparate narrators fit together. And when all the strands come together at the end — it’s truly remarkable.
Rating: ★★★★★
