November 2015 Book of the Month: Never Let Me Go

[Elizabeth]

Hello, iggles! I hope everyone had a wonderful, spooky Halloween. It's now the beginning of a new month, and that means new books! This month's theme was books by POC, or people of color, and the book voted on was Never Let Me Go. Here's the synopsis:

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.

As always, post your discussion thoughts, questions or reviews after you've finished. Since this book was also made into a movie a few years back, we might have to plan a watch-a-long - comment below whether you would be interested or not. Have a great November, lovelies!

[Melissa]

I read this a few months ago. I could never figure out why they did not try and run away. They had ample opportunity. This reinforces the "do they have a soul" theory.

I wrote about this book on my blog http://eris-discord42.blogspot.com/20...

Is it learned helplessness? They know they are going to die. They don't want to die but they seem to just give in without question.

[Kendall • thegeekyyogi]

I'll just say first that there are some spoilers here! If you haven't finished the book, don't read this yet :)

While I really enjoyed this book, I also found it extremely tragic. Throughout the whole book I felt there was this underlying sense of sadness and helplessness, even before I discovered the fact that they're all clones, raised to have their organs harvested, and then die. Even though the main focus is definitely the clones,(Kathy, Tommy and Ruth) and whether or not they have souls, a major focus of the book for me is how it touched on the fact we humans can abuse our "power" and continue to have prejudices against anyone that is different.
These children (clones) are raised, separate from the rest of the world and taught to embrace the fate that is coming to them, in what we humans thinks is the best way possible. Even though this is a work of fiction, it makes me question even more the society that we live in.
I've noticed from the many reviews I have read, that most people are concerned with why they did not try to run away. I don't think this is because they don't have souls, but more likely that they were brainwashed on some level. From the beginning the guardians gently feed them information, making it appear that this is the best and only option for them. Even though Kathy, Tommy and Ruth all see that there is another world out there, I believe that this duty is so ingrained in their brains that they feel it's their duty and not something they can turn there back on.
Overall I really did enjoy this book, I just think it touches on a lot of subjects that are very prevalent in this world and stirs up a lot of emotion. Or maybe I'm just crazy and read into it way too much haha.