Poll

SPOILER ALERT!Never Let Me Go

Never Let Me Go, by Kazuo Ishiguro

Choosing this book was utterly random, I had no particular reason for it.

Now, since this column is for sharing our views, obviously, I'll get right into it.

It's odd how with each sudden unexpected conversation with a person from the past brings something new to your perspective. How the words of others do affect you, how a chance encounter with Laura in the parking lot led Kathy to choose to be Ruth's carer, and how after that it led to being Tommy's carer, and finally someone else's after they both died. Maybe the thing that bothered me most about the book and caused me to give it only two stars was how Kathy took the whole experience. She was so stoic about it all, it was almost unreal. I know it's perfectly plausible, there are plenty of people who have large teaspoons (in Hermione's words) but compare her, with Tommy's getting out of the car in the middle of nowhere to get out a good tantrum, and Kathy, she just drove around to Norfolk, the place of lost things, a Hailsham thing, two bloody weeks after the fact, after the death of a close lover she supposedly had loved all her life, and closing her eyes to imagine him walking toward her, just another of those 'things' she has lost.
You could argue that the capacity to grieve had gone out of her by then, with the knowledge that she'd only been moulded to be someone's saviour, without her opinion or acquisition of it. Who knows why they had her be a carer for over a decade? Why didn't they give her her notice earlier? Was it really because she was a good carer and they thought she'd be a better carer than a donor?
Maybe at the very beginning when I read all this sombre talk of carers and donors I should've realised what a sad pit I was walking into, but by the time I realised this was how the entire story was gonna go, it was already too late, I was hooked. Let's just say if I ever found a place like Hailsham, I'd personally burn it down to the ground. Cancer patients nonwithstanding.

That was something Darshini!. But I understand not being able to stop even though you know how a book is going go. we all have that kind-of-self-destructive streak that overtakes us at times & wants to be-done-with something even if it is not to our liking.

Thanks for that frank share.

Jonaki wrote: "That was something Darshini!. But I understand not being able to stop even though you know how a book is going go. we all have that kind-of-self-destructive streak that overtakes us at times & want..."

Yeah. I like to be open-minded while selecting my books though, and not miss out on the story and the emotions just because I didn't enjoy the lack of emotion in the writing. This was an overall good read though, I don't regret jumping on.

Of course. That was already evident. Thank you for your frank share.