Feb 1
"Pandemics don’t approach like wars, with the distant thud of artillery growing louder every day and flashes of bombs on the horizon. They arrive in retrospect, essentially. It’s disorienting. The pandemic is far away and then it’s all around you, with seemingly no intermediate step."
no one has ever put into words what it felt like to live through the covid-19 pandemic as well as emily st. john mandel. station eleven and sea of tranquility are truly the two best books I've read about pandemics since albert camus' the plague.
I still remember seeing reports of a new virus in china in january 2020 and thinking, "oh that's nothing, it'll never affect me!" and going about my daily life. and then it was everywhere.