Sea of Tranquility
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By Emily St. John Mandel
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1 review
The award-winning, bestselling author of Station Eleven and The Glass Hotel returns with a novel of art, time, love and plague that takes the reader from Vancouver Island in 1912 to a dark colony of the moon three hundred years later, unfurling a story of humanity across centuries and space.
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Whitley Bay Book Group discussed Sea of Tranquility in May 2023.
This is the latest book by the author of Station 11, which we all loved. There are different strands to this plot which follows characters in different time periods who are linked by the time-travelling investigator Gaspery, and the connections become apparent in the course of the book. There is 23rd century novelist Olive, whose book tour is interrupted by a deadly pandemic, Edwin in 1912 Canada, and a reappearance of Vincent from The Glass Hotel.
All of the group love her style of writing, her humour and imagination. But we were divided about the time twists: some thought it was clever and poignant and thought-provoking but some found the time travel and science fiction aspects confusing or over complicated.
It was a good book club choice though as it raised a lot of big issues in the discussion, such as reality vs simulation, humanity vs authority.
We gave it between 2 and 4.5 stars, with an average of 3.5.
