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It’s 1912, and Edwin St. John St. Andrew is the third son of a future earl, which means his prospects are few, despite a good education. And after a rather stupid diatribe at a family dinner party, he’s essentially been exiled by his father. He decides to head to Canada, where he eventually lands on the west coast. There, he has a very strange experience in the forest: he hears odd whooshing sounds and a violin playing.
Two centuries later, author Olive Llewellyn is on a book tour. She’s lived on a colony on the moon her whole life and is away from home for a couple of months for the tour. In one of her books, she writes about a man playing violin in an airship terminal who briefly sees trees around him.
A century or so later, Gaspery-Jacques Roberts is sent to investigate these anomalies. He learns that Edwin ended up dying in an insane asylum, and Olive faced a terrible pandemic at the end of her tour. The company that sends him on this top-secret mission wants to know a few important facts; Gaspery ends up wanting to know even more. Though he has pledged not to cause problems with reality, he may find himself more tempted than he had expected.
Sea of Tranquility is the first book I’ve read by Emily St. John Mandel. Now, I want to read at least The Glass Hotel because of some clever little winks she made to that book. This story involves time travel and metaphysics and I thought those winks added to the “meta” vibe. It’s a short and fairly light book in genres I enjoy and kept me turning pages.
Rated: Moderate. Profanity includes 3 uses of strong language, 2 uses of mild language, and 6 instances of the name of Deity in vain. There’s not much other notable content.
