Different people like different stories, and they like those stories told in different ways. I like characters, but I want to see them do things. I don’t mind a story that covers a wide swath of time, but I generally find it annoying when it’s told out of order. Station Eleven by Emily ST. John Mandel breaks both of those as and is the sort of low-tech post apocalyptic science fiction that I never seek out.

You might assume pointing out all the reasons this book wasn’t written for me was an attempt to minimize the assault I intend to make on the book. A way to soften, explaining why I hated it. I have done that in the past, but in this case I explained all of it so I could say that Station Eleven mostly overcame all of that.

Station Eleven is the story of a theater troop traveling around the great lakes in the post apocalypse. A disease has killed ninety-nine percent of people, and the rest are just trying to survive. But the theater troop works on the idea that survival is not enough. The story also tells the life of a celebrity who died the day of that plague, but from a heart attack, not the plague. His life ties together the protagonist and antagonist of the story through a comic book that he gave both of them, which is the titular Station Eleven.

There is a lot of interesting stuff in this book. I especially enjoyed that while this is obviously not a happy book, it avoided the trope of making almost everyone in the post apocalypse evil or selfish. Most people are happy to see other people and happy to work with them when it’s possible, and the few people who aren’t are mostly that way for the same reason people in our world are terrible.

What kept this book from being fantastic for me was in part the things I mentioned at the top. This book started in a pretty big hole for me, and it took a lot of effort to dig itself out of that hole. Beyond that, large parts of the book felt more indulgent than necessary. Connecting the protagonist and antagonist of the story though the actor is in part the point of the story and in part entirely unnecessary. And, very little actually happens in the book, discounting the death of nearly everyone in the world, which happens outside of the story. They travel, get separated, have a few fights that while realistic weren’t that exciting, then get where they are going. The characters don’t change a lot. The world doesn’t change that much. It just keeps going. Perhaps that’s the point and perhaps that’s enough for most people, but I prefer books with a bit more meat on the plot bone.

I could totally understand this being someone’s favorite book, and so I would never suggest you not read it. If the idea of a story told in different time periods that slowly connects and a book almost entirely about characters simply tying to live appeals to you or if you like Emily St. John Mandel, then I know this will be a great book for you. But if you like me prefer a plot driven story that is just told to you without the flourishes, then it probably doesn’t need to be at the top of your list.