Station Eleven

  • Author: Emily St. John Mandel
  • Full Title: Station Eleven
  • Tags: #books #science-fiction #books-about-books
  • Recommendation: 10/10. This will probably end up as my favorite book of 2023. Right up there with [[Piranesi]] from last year. The world she creates is so interesting, the characters fascinating. The pacing is relaxing but keeps you wanting more. And the way the stories are interwoven are so wonderful.

Highlights

  • They live out their lives under flickering lights, aware at all times of the fathoms of ocean above them, resentful of Dr. Eleven and his colleagues who keep Station Eleven moving forever through deep space. (Pablo texts her: ??did u get my email???) They are always waiting, the people of the Undersea. They spend all their lives waiting for their lives to begin. (Location 1215)
  • a fairer way of putting this would be to say that adulthood’s full of ghosts.” (Location 2282)
  • “I’m talking about these people who’ve ended up in one life instead of another and they are just so disappointed. Do you know what I mean? They’ve done what’s expected of them. They want to do something different but it’s impossible now, there’s a mortgage, kids, whatever, they’re trapped. (Location 2284)
  • High-functioning sleepwalkers, essentially.” (Location 2287)
  • “because I think people like him think work is supposed to be drudgery punctuated by very occasional moments of happiness, but when I say happiness, I mostly mean distraction. (Location 2290)
  • when had he last found real joy in his work? When was the last time he’d been truly moved by anything? When had he last felt awe or inspiration? (Location 2304)
  • He found he was a man who repented almost everything, regrets crowding in around him like moths to a light. This was actually the main difference between twenty-one and fifty-one, he decided, the sheer volume of regret. (Location 4484)
  • Dr. Eleven: What was it like for you, at the end? Captain Lonagan: It was exactly like waking up from a dream. (Location 4536)