Reviews tagging 'Confinement'

Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

17 reviews

maddie_can_read's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

I remember watching the TV show for a few episodes a few years ago so it's interesting seeing what I remember/ what they changed.

I really enjoy the structure of the book, where you follow characters over time and space.

And the fact that you don't necessarily know at the beginning which characters you are going to follow. Like it's so interesting going back in time to a character that we already know is dead and learn more about them, their hopes and dreams, their impact on others and then see their death from a totally different perspective. Very humanizing. Loved the "twist" of knowing who the prophet was and the parallels between his trauma and Kristen's trauma

. Also really enjoy the writing style. I like the feeling of not knowing where the author is taking you.

Loved all the Canadian and especially the Toronto references!

I have a difficult time visualizing some books but thought this book was written in a way that really facilitated visualizing what was happening, being familiar with Toronto also probably helped though.

I also enjoyed the tone of the book, it felt neither overly optimistic or pessimistic in imagining a post-apocalyptic world. 

One minor critique is that some of the side characters were difficult to distinguish between.

Specifically, Kristen's traveling symphony friends

I also kind of wished we had seen the reunion between Kristen and Jevin and if they 'd figure out how they knew each other

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Suicide, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Child death and Death of parent

Minor: Rape and Blood

parfait52's review against another edition

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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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Death of parent, Murder, Alcohol, Confinement, Cursing, Kidnapping, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Pandemic/Epidemic, Violence, Stalking, Gun violence, and Blood

Minor: Pregnancy, Child death, Alcoholism, Drug use, Rape, and Sexual assault

danimcthomas's review against another edition

adventurous dark sad 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? It's complicated

5.0

Absolute perfection. I still haven’t stopped thinking about it. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Confinement, Violence, Grief, Medical trauma, Suicide, Death of parent, Murder, and Pandemic/Epidemic

annaofjesup's review against another edition

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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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Alcohol, Death, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Gun violence, and Murder

Minor: Car accident, Cursing, Child death, Death of parent, Sexual assault, Confinement, Pregnancy, and Rape

tremayna's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful reflective tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pandemic/Epidemic and Infidelity

Moderate: Violence, Domestic abuse, Classism, Grief, Kidnapping, Murder, Religious bigotry, Death, and Gun violence

Minor: Child death, Emotional abuse, Death of parent, Suicide, Confinement, Rape, Child abuse, Alcoholism, Medical content, and Pedophilia

Written before the 2020 pandemic, this book about a fictional global viral event was disorienting to read in the year 2023, so closely following the eerily parallel events that came to pass in real life. Much of the real life pandemic is still in progress; its effects continue to leave their mark; the process of compartmentalizing memories of things surreal and too big to process without a biweekly therapy plan is still happening. Picking up this book jolted me back into the thick of pandemic thinking, creating a literal sense of disorientation where I was looking around me wondering how people could be sitting so close, maskless, touching everything without thought, when I hadn't seen the world that way in at least a year and a half. For that reason alone, I have to commend the writing. And at the same time, the author's delicate touch and the many moments of human normalcy, in both pre-event and post-event scenes, prevented the complete despair that could have pervaded this story. I felt St John Mandel balanced total devastation with enough possibility to keep the reader believing in the likelihood of meaningful survival without overdoing it and allowing the story to devolve into purely a feel good fantasy.

My one remaining frustration by the end was how little of Jeevan's growth we got to see. It was thankfully alluded to in enough detail to let the reader form a picture. But as the first point of view character, he was the one that had my investment from the start, and I slightly resented Arthur's story for edging it out, especially since Jeevan's story could also have neatly covered Tyler and Elizabeth's character development.

juliahendrickson's review against another edition

challenging reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Blood, Child death, Death, Violence, Fire/Fire injury, Abandonment, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Adult/minor relationship, Confinement, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Pregnancy, Sexual violence, Murder, Suicide, Chronic illness, Death of parent, and Stalking

undecidedpersonality's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Murder, Terminal illness, Animal cruelty, Grief, Gun violence, and Medical content

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Kidnapping, Abandonment, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Animal death, Pedophilia, and Body horror

Minor: Fire/Fire injury, Rape, Alcohol, Drug use, Child death, Confinement, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Religious bigotry, Suicidal thoughts, and Sexual content

mouse42's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad tense medium-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? Yes

4.5

I know I’m late to the party, but I really enjoyed this book. It gave me a different perspective on life and how humans cope with difficult situations. The interwoven stories of the characters was beautifully done. 

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Content Warnings

Minor: Religious bigotry, Blood, Confinement, Gun violence, Murder, Child death, Death, Death of parent, and Grief

naomi_k's review against another edition

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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Content Warnings

Graphic: Religious bigotry, Terminal illness, Grief, Medical trauma, Murder, Confinement, Violence, Death, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Medical content, and Trafficking

Moderate: Kidnapping, Cursing, Toxic relationship, and Forced institutionalization

Minor: Sexual content and Suicide

owenwilsonbaby's review against another edition

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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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Pedophilia, Death of parent, Death, Medical content, Pregnancy, Abandonment, Child abuse, Confinement, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual violence, Cursing, Grief, Gun violence, and Mental illness