Reviews tagging 'Ableism'

Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

12 reviews

orchidlilly's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

3.75

It's interesting to read a post pandemic apocalypse after the whole actual pandemic. It's well written, and I always like split perspective and split timelines. I feel like some of the plot points could have been tied up clearer, for a book that so deliberately makes sure all the characters have oelverlapping lives, we sort of miss out on what happens with Elizabeth. It just feels like that plot line was left unconcerned, while everyone else had their loose ends tied up.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Confinement, Death, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Grief, Religious bigotry, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Animal death, Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Pedophilia, Sexual assault, Terminal illness, Blood, Medical content, Kidnapping, Stalking, Death of parent, Pregnancy, and Abandonment

Minor: Ableism, Adult/minor relationship, Cursing, Rape, and Excrement

spineofthesaurus's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Misogyny, Suicide, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Blood, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Medical trauma, Murder, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Ableism, Alcoholism, Animal death, Child death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Infidelity, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Trafficking, Religious bigotry, Stalking, Abandonment, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Adult/minor relationship, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Sexual violence, Car accident, and Pregnancy

writeronherway's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective slow-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Ableism and Murder

kelly_e's review against another edition

adventurous challenging reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

Title: Station Eleven
Author: Emily St. John Mandel
Genre: Science Fiction
Rating: 3.00
Pub Date: September 9, 2014

T H R E E • W O R D S

Evocative • Ambitious • Eerie

📖 S Y N O P S I S

Kirsten Raymonde will never forget the night Arthur Leander, the famous Hollywood actor, had a heart attack on stage during a production of King Lear. That was the night when a devastating flu pandemic arrived in the city, and within weeks, civilization as we know it came to an end.

Twenty years later, Kirsten moves between the settlements of the altered world with a small troupe of actors and musicians. They call themselves The Traveling Symphony, and they have dedicated themselves to keeping the remnants of art and humanity alive. But when they arrive in St. Deborah by the Water, they encounter a violent prophet who will threaten the tiny band’s existence. And as the story takes off, moving back and forth in time, and vividly depicting life before and after the pandemic, the strange twist of fate that connects them all will be revealed.

💭 T H O U G H T S

Despite hearing (and reading) so many glowing reviews from my bookish community for Station Eleven, I had no plan to pick it up... until it landed on the 2023 Canada Reads shortlist. Since 2021, I've made a point of reading as many books from the longlist as possible, with a particular focus on the five shortlisted titles. And so, despite knowing this wasn't likely to be my cup of tea, I borrowed a digital copy from my library.

I'll start by saying, I truly appreciated the dystopian Canadian content. Emily St. John Mandel has carefully constructed a realistic (eerily so) and reflective tale of post-apocalyptic survival. And of course, it's incredibly well written. While I know the ambiguous ending has been a point of contention between readers, for me it actually seemed the most fitting.

Despite that, I just wasn't a fan of the story or the structure. It's told in three different timelines from several points of view, and I definitely liked certain section a lot more than others. At times, I found myself disappointed to reach the end of a chapter only to find out I'd be ripped from what was happening in that storyline. Additionally, the plot just held very little interest for me. I'll admit coming out of a pandemic was probably not the right time to read this book, and it's quite possible the past three years impacted my reading experience.

I completely understand why so many readers love Emily St. John Mandel's descriptive and poetic writing style, yet Station Eleven was not a book for me. I don't think it's surprising it landed on this years Canada Reads list, as it definitely stimulates thought and discussion. I am looking forward to seeing how it'll fair on the panel, but in my opinion it doesn't necessarily fit the theme of shifting one's perspective.

📚 R E C O M M E N D • T O
• Emily St. John Mandel enthusiasts
• readers looking for pandemic fiction

🔖 F A V O U R I T E • Q U O T E S

"What I mean to say is, the more you remember, the more you've lost." 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gun violence, Terminal illness, Violence, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Death of parent, and Murder

Moderate: Infidelity, Suicide, Blood, Kidnapping, Religious bigotry, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Ableism, Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Child death, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Pregnancy, and Alcohol

rosemary_for_remembrance's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gun violence, Terminal illness, Violence, Grief, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Ableism, Suicide, Kidnapping, and Murder

leabhar_love's review against another edition

adventurous dark tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No

2.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Death, Rape, Suicide, and Suicide attempt

lynxpardinus's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Child death, Death, Gun violence, Suicide, Violence, Medical content, Kidnapping, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Ableism, Animal death, Drug use, Infidelity, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Toxic relationship, Blood, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Alcohol, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Rape and War

Adult/minor relationship warning is partially for a couple who met when one was a minor. Ableism warning is for the trope of a disabled character dying as part of an abled character's story. Colonisation warning is just in case, for discussion of Israel in a normalized light.

imoran's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Death and Violence

Minor: Ableism, Gore, Blood, and Classism

jugglingcoder's review against another edition

reflective slow-paced

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

2.0

The plot is slow and if you don't like a character there can be long stretches of just that character. The characters are all "connected" but in a way that I didn't find compelling. The actual writing was nice and easy to read. There are some ableist moments that suggest it's better to be dead than disabled because you could be a burden.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Ableism and Suicide

whirl's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful reflective sad 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? No

4.0

The description of the start of the pandemic are a bit too spot on now that there has been a pandemic.. although it really highlights how lucky we’ve been that covid-19 was much less deadly!

The book has a nice pace, and just ambles through the lives of various survivors loosely connected to each other before the pandemic hits

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Grief

Moderate: Ableism, Violence, and Kidnapping

Minor: Child death, Gun violence, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Death of parent, and Murder

While the book describes a post apocalyptic world which is clearly more lawless and violent, it doesn’t go into unnecessarily detailed descriptions and is more about what happens to people’s minds and personality to live in such a world