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A review by booksarebrainfood
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
4.0
I really enjoyed getting to know this story again after having seen the film in my teenage years.
I think this story is a really good exploration of friendship, insular communities, the edges of morality, and creation. *spoilers*
Plot 0.5 stars: I was really compelled by the story and the drip-feed of information that you get about Hailsham, the characters, and why they are special. It isn't the most intricate of plots but it was enough to keep me interested throughout.
Characters 1 star: This is where this book really shines. The trio of Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy with the other students at the school and at the Cottages really showed an in-depth understanding of friendship dynamics at a teenage level and how these mature through life and undergo various strains. It also looks at dynamics in insular communities, how they rely on each other for everything and make rumours into a reality by not having a clear structure. Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy are very flawed but very real characters, and their reality only adds to the argument that even though they are artificially created life they are still as real as the people they were modeled off. Their depth supports the novel's argument that creating life is more of a responsibility than they are aware of, and makes their story all the more tragic.
Writing 1 star: I forgot throughout almost all of this novel that it was a male author because Kathy's viewpoint was so well nuanced she was so real to me, which is a good sign of Ishiguro's writing style. Ishiguro's writing is a pleasure to read, and the idyllic descriptions of Hailsham were captivating and intriguing. He does a lot with very little and does the first-person narrative in a way that is not easy to achieve.
World Engagement / Building 0.5 star: This book engages with a lot of different issues, it explores morality in a literal sense and the responsibility of creating life and what we owe to each other. The children's emphasis on art and creation links to their physical donations and shows the dangers of what our system demands from us in terms of output and productivity. In terms of its own world-building as a dystopia I'm not sure how well it did, you never get a full explanation of why they are created to donate or what time period it is meant to be (probably commenting on how little the protagonists know about the world and their own creation). The sense of mystery does add to the story and I think it is a comment on how little we actually know about the systems that sustain our lifestyles and things we turn a blind eye too while others are suffering (eg. eating meat, fast fashion, fossil fuel mining etc). In terms of payoff, I was expecting a little bit more but I think it allows us to focus on the characters as this is a character-driven novel.
Enjoyability 1 star: I blazed through this in a couple of days, I found the story compelling, the characters interesting and the prose easy to digest. It would make a great holiday read or something quick and captivating to get you thinking about the moral issues that we face on a daily basis as our knowledge of science becomes more powerful every day.
I think this story is a really good exploration of friendship, insular communities, the edges of morality, and creation. *spoilers*
Plot 0.5 stars: I was really compelled by the story and the drip-feed of information that you get about Hailsham, the characters, and why they are special. It isn't the most intricate of plots but it was enough to keep me interested throughout.
Characters 1 star: This is where this book really shines. The trio of Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy with the other students at the school and at the Cottages really showed an in-depth understanding of friendship dynamics at a teenage level and how these mature through life and undergo various strains. It also looks at dynamics in insular communities, how they rely on each other for everything and make rumours into a reality by not having a clear structure. Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy are very flawed but very real characters, and their reality only adds to the argument that even though they are artificially created life they are still as real as the people they were modeled off. Their depth supports the novel's argument that creating life is more of a responsibility than they are aware of, and makes their story all the more tragic.
Writing 1 star: I forgot throughout almost all of this novel that it was a male author because Kathy's viewpoint was so well nuanced she was so real to me, which is a good sign of Ishiguro's writing style. Ishiguro's writing is a pleasure to read, and the idyllic descriptions of Hailsham were captivating and intriguing. He does a lot with very little and does the first-person narrative in a way that is not easy to achieve.
World Engagement / Building 0.5 star: This book engages with a lot of different issues, it explores morality in a literal sense and the responsibility of creating life and what we owe to each other. The children's emphasis on art and creation links to their physical donations and shows the dangers of what our system demands from us in terms of output and productivity. In terms of its own world-building as a dystopia I'm not sure how well it did, you never get a full explanation of why they are created to donate or what time period it is meant to be (probably commenting on how little the protagonists know about the world and their own creation). The sense of mystery does add to the story and I think it is a comment on how little we actually know about the systems that sustain our lifestyles and things we turn a blind eye too while others are suffering (eg. eating meat, fast fashion, fossil fuel mining etc). In terms of payoff, I was expecting a little bit more but I think it allows us to focus on the characters as this is a character-driven novel.
Enjoyability 1 star: I blazed through this in a couple of days, I found the story compelling, the characters interesting and the prose easy to digest. It would make a great holiday read or something quick and captivating to get you thinking about the moral issues that we face on a daily basis as our knowledge of science becomes more powerful every day.