Station Eleven

Emily St. John Mandel's "Station Eleven" is a post-apocalyptic novel that shifts between the time before and after the Georgia Flu pandemic wipes out most of the world's population. It centers on a traveling troupe of actors and musicians, the Traveling Symphony, who perform Shakespeare for the scattered settlements in the Great Lakes region. The narrative weaves together the lives of several interconnected characters, including a famous actor who dies on stage the night the pandemic begins, his first wife who is the creator of the graphic novel *Station Eleven*, and a young actress in the Symphony. The novel explores themes of art, memory, loss, and the endurance of human connection and culture in a world fundamentally changed. (654 characters)