Bookshot #72: Never Let Me Go

I had never read a single book by Ishiguro before picking up Never Let Me Go and he's now made my list of authors I should read more of- especially The Remains Of The Day- though I do think I already have When We Were Orphans kicking around the place so that will probably be my next Ishiguro conquest.

But where to begin with Never Let Me Go?  I did my best to avoid Wikipedia-ing plot spoilers for either the book or the movie, so I had only the vaguest idea of what was going down.  The novel tells the story of Kathy, now thirty one and looking back on her idyllic childhood at Hailsham School where she becomes friends with Tommy and Ruth as they proceed through childhood, into adulthood, trying to figure out their place in the world and what their real identities actually are.

It's hard to know where to begin with this book.  Ishiguro is subtle with his plot development and equally subtle with his characters.  Everything is fragile, uncertain and you get a real sense of the characters growing up and coming to terms with who they are and what they're supposed to be doing with their lives- and it's so subtle that it feels like you're reading just another coming of age novel.  The struggles of the characters feel...  normal.   Everyone just seems to be growing up and heading for jobs as 'donors' and 'carers' until they eventually 'complete.'

And that's where the mastery of Ishiguro starts to build to a boil.  You sense immediately that something is not quite right about Hailsham or the vaguely referenced 'fates' that are in store for the characters, but Ishiguro only gives you hints about what it might be.   Soon enough, they graduate from Hailsham and get sent to various Cottages to live and work until they are called to be donors and carers and that's when the real truth begins to emerge.   All of these characters (and this is where it gets spoiler-y, so stop reading now) are clones.  Clones whose sole purpose is to provide organs for their original copies until they can't make any more donations and 'complete,' or, in other words, die.

Just like that, things get disturbingly sinister.   No one seems to question this state of affairs- not even the characters themselves.   Whether through gentle social programming or just because they never find a viable alternative to what they've been designed to do, the characters accept their fates and don't ask questions.  They do their best to savor every small moment in life and then they start donations and die- but a fleeting hope, a rumored salvation sends two of the characters in search of possible hope and what they find there just adds to the chilling horror of Ishiguro's tale.

Overall:  I spent the first third of this book wondering what was going on, the second third of this book getting bored with what was going on and the last third of this book being genuinely creeped out by the world that Ishiguro had created.  Underneath the fine veneer of typical English countryside there's something genuinely chilling going on and I'm nut sure what bothered me more:  the fact that such a future was not only possible but plausible or the fact that the majority of society seemed to be okay with it.   With such dystopian visions like Brave New World and 1984, the reader is at least, given plenty of time to realize the horrible nature of the worlds that those characters inhabit, Ishiguro on the other hand takes a different route, lifting the veil slowly but surely and then landing a mule kick right in your gut as he shows you exactly how deep the darkness in the rabbit hole really goes.  *** out of ****