Station Eleven

I was so sure I would DNF this book. It sounded like an overdone premise - world is wiped out by a plague. Ho hum. Yet, I ended up reading this book in two hours. It's rare for me to appreciate a literary novel wearing the cloak of genre fiction this way.

Most of the time, books like these are poorly executed (I am looking at you, The Passage.) pompous, pretentious and overdone.

But the beautiful writing hooked me in and then it was the characters' journeys.

There isn't much of a plot per se; instead the book is an examination of how one man affected the lives of the people around him - before and after the plague that wipes most of humanity. I was surprised by how moved I was that. Navel gazing books usually annoy me.

Selfish characters become selfless ones. Innocent people become the personification of evil.

Ultimately the lesson of this book is this: our decisions have a ripple effect. How often do we take what we have for granted until it's too late? And even if you realise that you have taken a wrong turn, sometimes it's just too late to change course because life happens. Or a plague breaks out and everyone you know dies.