A review by sonyakalara
Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense slow-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? No

2.75

I really wanted to like this book but Station Eleven has some structural and stylistic issues in my eyes. Firstly, the world feels a bit too small in that the central 4-5 characters meet after the flu in ways that are highly improbable. It’s not convincing that they would accidentally run into each other again in a plague stricken world. The character growth also didn’t seem that convincing; side characters were introduced to create an impetus for change in the main characters and then they disappear into the background again which doesn’t feel like truly self-motivated change. Stylistically, the book does a lot more ‘telling’ as opposed to ‘showing’ so many of the characters feel like shells with descriptions rather than full people. I never forgot that I was reading a book, I was never hopelessly enveloped into this world. I will say that the Station Eleven comics are an incredible focal point for the book and the concept of a Travelling post-apocalyptic Symphony is pretty rad. All in all though, this one is a definite skip. 
Expand filter menu Content Warnings