Average Bufph Rating: 4.0 / 5.0
Kazuo Ishiguro
2005-04-05
NOBEL PRIZE WINNER • From the acclaimed, bestselling author of The Remains of the Day comes “a Gothic tour de force" (The New York Times) with an extraordinary twist—a moving, suspenseful, beautifully atmospheric modern classic.
One of The New York Times’s 10 Best Books of the 21st Century • A Kirkus Reviews Best Fiction Book of the Century • A Los Angeles Times Best Fiction Book of the Last 30 Years
As children, Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy were students at Hailsham, an exclusive boarding school secluded in the English countryside. It was a place of mercurial cliques and mysterious rules where teachers were constantly reminding their charges of how special they were.
Now, years later, Kathy is a young woman. Ruth and Tommy have reentered her life. And for the first time she is beginning to look back at their shared past and understand just what it is that makes them special—and how that gift will shape the rest of their time together.
Kazuo Ishiguro's novel is a masterclass in subtlety, intertwining pathos with a serene narrative pace. It's a haunting exploration of memory and the ethical quagmires of scientific progress, rendered with a minimalist aesthetic that's both stark and beautiful. The world-building here is less about futuristic tech and more about the poignant decay of an idyllic boarding school setting. This book challenged my usual predilection for high-concept sci-fi, offering a slow-burn contemplation on humanity and morality that left a lingering impression.
