Reviews tagging 'Cursing'

Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

10 reviews

parfait52's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

It took me several months to get through this book, which is saying something because it's fairly short. Every time I picked it up, I was interested enough. Once I put it down, though, I didn't feel the need to pick it back up. This book doesn't really have a plot so much as it has a story. And once you figure out how the story is forming and the author is doing, it's very easy to know where it's going to go. At times, I found the writing to be beautiful and profound. I found the concept fascinating, but the execution was stifling at points. There were several parts of the book that I personally found very boring and wanted to get past immediately. Overall, not a bad read. There are just books I've enjoyed more.

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annaofjesup's review against another edition

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adventurous reflective slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0


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kananineko's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional hopeful mysterious reflective fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0


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naomi_k's review against another edition

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dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0


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whatathymeitwas's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0


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owenwilsonbaby's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

"He woke to quiet voices. This had been happening more and more lately, this nodding off unexpectedly, and it left him with an unsettled intimation of rehearsal. You fall asleep for short periods and then for longer periods and then forever."

Compellingly written prose with a well-developed cast of characters. Whilst I wish Kristen's storyline had more events within it, I really liked the book and I think it is both hopeful and unsentimental about humanity, in a way that I suspect might be altered in the TV adaptation. 

This book has a lot to say about art and community-building and the role these will play in coming crises. It felt resonant with ecological anxieties about climate change and social anxieties in the age of COVID-19. Some of the passages about process and industrialisation felt a tad oversimplified and neoliberal - surely an Amazon delivery driver or a factory worker making snowglobes has complex, nuanced feelings about their labour and their lives that goes beyond gratitude for a job - but everything else was thoughtful, interesting, well-paced and moving. I loved Kirsten and Miranda. What wonderful characters.

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readerette's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional hopeful reflective fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

I could not put this down. I was immersed. I've never experienced an apocalyptic story that came so close to feeling real--how things seem like they would really go if something world-ending came to pass. Aside from Part 7 being too long and unfocused for my taste, I loved it all: the writing, the characters, the relationships, the new world that came to be, the little things people remembered or cherished... Just beautiful. She's captured the little world within a world that each of us builds by way of the people we are connected to; the ones we know our whole lives and the ones we meet indirectly through their art or work or or mutual friends; the ones we meet early and the ones we meet later; the ones we lose for a while and the ones we lose forever; the ones who were part of some milestone and the ones who were a constant.

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bibliophilemama's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional reflective fast-paced

4.0


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pastelkerstin's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0


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bookishbutch's review

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adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious reflective medium-paced
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

What a beautiful, poignant novel! It's, at its core, a love letter to the power of the arts and the bonds and love between total strangers who are just as scared and lonely as you. All in all, a lovely book.

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