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Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
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Never Let Me Go (original 2005; edition 2006)

by Kazuo Ishiguro

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingConversations / Mentions
22,747938164 (3.81)2 / 1384
Hailsham seems like a pleasant English boarding school, far from the influences of the city. Its students are well tended and supported, trained in art and literature, and become just the sort of people the world wants them to be. But, curiously, they are taught nothing of the outside world and are allowed little contact with it. Within the grounds of Hailsham, Kathy grows from schoolgirl to young woman, but it's only when she and her friends Ruth and Tommy leave the safe grounds of the school (as they always knew they would) that they realize the full truth of what Hailsham is.… (more)
Member:Meghan1021
Title:Never Let Me Go
Authors:Kazuo Ishiguro
Info:Vintage (2006), Paperback, 304 pages
Collections:Read but unowned
Rating:****
Tags:fiction, literary fiction, dystopia

Work Information

Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro (Author) (2005)

  1. 473
    The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood (readerbabe1984, rosylibrarian, ateolf, browner56)
    browner56: Two chilling, though extremely well written, reminders that liberty, freedom, and self-determination are not idle concepts.
  2. 323
    Brave New World by Aldous Huxley (sanddancer)
  3. 215
    Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood (jessicaskura, readerbabe1984)
  4. 121
    Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury (joannasephine)
    joannasephine: A similar society, and a similar obliqueness to the most striking aspects of the story.
  5. 100
    Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick (absurdeist)
  6. 90
    The Children of Men by P. D. James (Yells)
  7. 90
    The Unit by Ninni Holmqvist (infiniteletters, bookcrushblog)
  8. 102
    Under the Skin by Michel Faber (Medellia, SqueakyChu)
  9. 71
    Unwind by Neal Shusterman (VictoriaPL, meggyweg, ahappybooker, LAKobow)
    ahappybooker: Similar themes of dystopia and vivisection
    LAKobow: This series also deals with dystopian organ donation
  10. 96
    The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (Monika_L)
  11. 20
    The House of the Scorpion by Nancy Farmer (jennyellen22)
  12. 10
    The Testament of Jessie Lamb by Jane Rogers (Nickelini)
  13. 21
    The Pesthouse by Jim Crace (urania1)
    urania1: If you enjoy dystopian fiction or long for "literary" science fiction, read this book. It deals with the big questions, namely can people retain their humanity in dehumanizing conditions?
  14. 10
    We by Yevgeny Zamyatin (joannasephine)
  15. 10
    Thirteen by Richard K. Morgan (WildMaggie)
    WildMaggie: A thriller and a tragic romance--both authors explore the ethics of people created for specific purposes from the perspectives of those created individuals.
  16. 21
    We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler (BookshelfMonstrosity)
    BookshelfMonstrosity: Though it is less witty than We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves, Never Let Me Go is another poignant and insightful story about biological experimentation and human identity. Both novels feature lyrical prose, well-developed characterization, and haunting tones of melancholy.… (more)
  17. 10
    Meat by Joseph D'Lacey (hoddybook)
    hoddybook: The subject matter of both involves a dystopian future in which some people are more worthy of support than others. Ishiguro is more genteel than D'Lacey. Unless you really want to know what's in your daily pinta, I'd give Meat a miss, on the other hand...… (more)
  18. 00
    Clone by Richard Cowper (infiniteletters)
  19. 11
    The Girl with All the Gifts by M. R. Carey (LAKobow)
    LAKobow: Dystopian novel with special kids raised in mysterious circumstances, with little knowledge of the outside world until they find out who they really are.
  20. 00
    The Old Child and the Book of Words by Jenny Erpenbeck (rrmmff2000)
    rrmmff2000: Unsettling narratives and fantastic writing about teenaged girls growing up muffled from the world.

(see all 34 recommendations)

Asia (37)
Florida (83)
Teens (8)
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Group TopicMessagesLast Message 
 Book Fiend: Never let me go2 unread / 2kjuliff, June 2021
 Chertsey Bookclub: Never Let Me Go - discussed 15/09/102 unread / 2PollyCCC, September 2010

» See also 1384 mentions

English (893)  Dutch (10)  Spanish (7)  German (5)  French (5)  Italian (4)  Swedish (2)  Norwegian (1)  Catalan (1)  Finnish (1)  Portuguese (Portugal) (1)  Galician (1)  Japanese (1)  All languages (932)
Showing 1-5 of 893 (next | show all)
Another book that I had looked forward to reading and ended up disappointed ( )
  thatnerd | Mar 2, 2024 |
A real page turner. You know from the beginning something is wrong with the characters, but you do not find out for some time ... The novel raises good questions about what we choose to do as a society. ( )
  INeilC | Feb 24, 2024 |
Mixed feelings here.

Very easy to read and rather compelling -- I felt drawn to it when I wasn't reading -- but overall I'm let down.

It's hard to discuss without spoiling but I found the mysterious aspects of the plot disappointing in the end. I wish we had had more insight into the Guardians from the very beginning. The childhood/teenaged angst and love triangle with Kath/Ruth/Tommy was familiar to me and felt realistic (likely because I had a Ruth-like friend in high school!) but that too was ultimately unsatisfying.

Not interested at all in seeing the movie but am interested in reading more Ishiguro.

( )
  hmonkeyreads | Jan 25, 2024 |
Finished Never Let Me Go a couple of days ago, just under a week, the fastest I've read a novel in I duneven know how long. I wouldn't even describe it as a page turner, just crisply written and well paced, with 10 to 12 page chapters (chapter length imo is underrated in a book's readability, the shorter the better, I just started Cry the Beloved Country and it has super-brisk 5 and 6 page chapters, I'm a fan).

No science fiction, but there is for sure a fictional world aspect to it, that is to say that it's set in England in the 1970's to the 1990's, and the world is somewhat different from ours, although the difference is subtle and never quite spelled out the characters the book revolves around are rather on the horns of the difference.

I'm certainly looking forward to reading more Ishiguro, at the very least Remains of the Day and the new one, which does promise from what I've heard just a bit of the Science Fiction (although again, he's very obviously not interested in "science fiction" any more than Lionel Shriver is interested in "parallel universes," if that makes any sense). ( )
  aleshh | Jan 12, 2024 |
3.5 as I was expecting something different. It was a good book but I wish that there was more explanation / world building. ( )
  devilhoo | Jan 3, 2024 |
Showing 1-5 of 893 (next | show all)
Ishiguro is extremely good at recreating the special, oppressive atmosphere of school (and any other institution, for that matter)—the cliques that form, the covert rivalries, the obsessive concern with who sat next to whom, who was seen talking to whom, who is in favor at one moment and who is not.
added by jburlinson | editNew York Review of Books, Anita Desai (pay site) (Nov 22, 2005)
 
The eeriest feature of this alien world is how familiar it feels. It's like a stripped-down, haiku vision of children everywhere, fending off the chaos of existence by inventing their own rules.
 
"Never Let Me Go" is marred by a slapdash, explanatory ending that recalls the stilted, tie-up-all-the loose-ends conclusion of Hitchcock's "Psycho." The remainder of the book, however, is a Gothic tour de force that showcases the same gifts that made Mr. Ishiguro's 1989 novel, "The Remains of the Day," such a cogent performance.
 
This extraordinary and, in the end, rather frighteningly clever novel isn't about cloning, or being a clone, at all. It's about why we don't explode, why we don't just wake up one day and go sobbing and crying down the street, kicking everything to pieces out of the raw, infuriating, completely personal sense of our lives never having been what they could have been.
added by mikeg2 | editThe Guardian, John Harrison (Feb 26, 2005)
 

» Add other authors (18 possible)

Author nameRoleType of authorWork?Status
Ishiguro, KazuoAuthorprimary authorall editionsconfirmed
Bützow, HeleneTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Fox, KerryNarratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Kriek, BarthoTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Landor, RosalynNarratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Novarese, PaolaTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Röhrig, JohannesEditorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Schaden, BarbaraTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
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To Lorna and Naomi
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My name is Kathy H.
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Wikipedia in English (2)

Hailsham seems like a pleasant English boarding school, far from the influences of the city. Its students are well tended and supported, trained in art and literature, and become just the sort of people the world wants them to be. But, curiously, they are taught nothing of the outside world and are allowed little contact with it. Within the grounds of Hailsham, Kathy grows from schoolgirl to young woman, but it's only when she and her friends Ruth and Tommy leave the safe grounds of the school (as they always knew they would) that they realize the full truth of what Hailsham is.

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Book description
At the age of thirty-one, Kathy H. is coming to the end of her time as a career – a milestone that prompts her to reflect on her unusual life. She begins, naturally, with her childhood at Hailsham, where she and her friends Ruth and Tommy negotiated the lessons and Exchanges set by their guardians, as well as the constant social pressures of school life. As her recollections progress, however, Kathy must take care not to delve too deeply into the tangled knot of her own emotions. The past holds no refuge for her; even since childhood, the knowledge of what the future holds has always been there, deep down – and some truths are too terrible to be confronted.

AR Level 6.0, 15 pts
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