Emily St. John Mandel: Sea of Tranquility (Paperback, 2023, HarperCollins Publishers)
Pocketbok, 320 sidor
Publicerades 15 september 2023 av HarperCollins Publishers.
An easy read, and the crossovers with her other books were interesting. I enjoyed this one quite a bit.
I liked the intertwined storylines and i thought the characters were well drawn and sympathetic. The only problem I had was the idea of the continuation of culture over hundreds of years. it rang false to me.
I found this touching and hopeful, I liked how poignantly the characters were drawn, and the themes of kindness and the vicissitudes of life.
My main complaint was that I think the simulation theory stuff was basically an unnecessary macguffin and didn't add to the themes (at least as far as they interested me).
I found this touching and hopeful, I liked how poignantly the characters were drawn, and the themes of kindness and the vicissitudes of life.
My main complaint was that I think the simulation theory stuff was basically an unnecessary macguffin and didn't add to the themes (at least as far as they interested me).
Nice short book. Nothing groundbreaking but adequately conveyed it's purpose.
Nice short book. Nothing groundbreaking but adequately conveyed it's purpose.
The (excellent) TV adaptation of Emily (St John?) Mandel's Station Eleven, about a pandemic, was in the works for years before being released mid-pandemic and permanently designating her That Covid Writer. Of course she has to deal with that in this novel. And so we have an actual (albeit 23rd century) version of her in the novel, linked to a bunch of others through time glitches. Which, arguably, is what fiction is; echoes of a moment through different times and narrators.
I'm not sure the ending needs to be as neat as it is. I kind of want it to be messier. And I'm torn between loving how little she changes mankind over 500 years and wanting there to be more that's unexplained. But again, she manages to create characters whose stasis (hey, it's a Covid novel) feels both relatable, horrifying and rich.
The (excellent) TV adaptation of Emily (St John?) Mandel's Station Eleven, about a pandemic, was in the works for years before being released mid-pandemic and permanently designating her That Covid Writer. Of course she has to deal with that in this novel. And so we have an actual (albeit 23rd century) version of her in the novel, linked to a bunch of others through time glitches. Which, arguably, is what fiction is; echoes of a moment through different times and narrators.
I'm not sure the ending needs to be as neat as it is. I kind of want it to be messier. And I'm torn between loving how little she changes mankind over 500 years and wanting there to be more that's unexplained. But again, she manages to create characters whose stasis (hey, it's a Covid novel) feels both relatable, horrifying and rich.
Fantastic to a point I did not expect. Very meta, and covers aspects that took me by surprise. I rarely read the descriptions of books written by authors that I have read before, and here it totally paid off. If you have read the previous two works by this author, you will like where this book takes you.
