Book Review: Sea of Tranquility (2022). Emily St. John Mandel.

This is an earnest first attempt at a real science-fiction novel by the author of Station Eleven, which follows a number of ordinary human characters in different earth eras, from the early 20th century to an imagined future a few centuries ahead, where there are human colonies on the moon, and in deep space too.

In addition to those sci-fi story creations and plot premises, she also includes a time travel element, and plays with the contemporary fascination with the possibility of reality being nothing more than an advanced computer simulation. In this book, she imagines a world where that may in fact be the case, but also poses the question of whether that actually matters to the people experiencing that reality.

There’s also a global pandemic in the story, and an author separated from her family, on a book tour at its onset, who may or may not die as a result of the disease. Remember that this story is coming from a popular real author, who had previously written a real novel about a global pandemic (Station Eleven), then had to keep functioning as a professional writer and mother during an actual pandemic. There’s something so familiar sounding about that scenario! A little projection onto her fictional character, perhaps?

As with her other books, Mandel’s strength is in creating believable characters with whom we can empathize, and believable dialogue in unusual or unfamiliar situations. Even though the story suggests themes of the COVID-19 era of the past two years, and our collective experience of it, it is still an entertaining and engaging tale. Recommended.