Chris’s Pick
October 2021
Klara and the Sun
Kazuo Ishiguro
Nobel-prize winning author Kazuo Ishiguro’s latest novel, Klara and the Sun, set in the near future, is narrated by Klara, who serves as one child’s AF or “artificial friend.” Artificial Friends are beings who look like real people but are programmed with artificial intelligence and kept alive by solar-power.
I had heard Ishiguro’s new novel was a masterpiece but, as I am not generally drawn to science fiction, it wasn’t until “Klara and The Sun” appeared on Obama’s Summer Reading List that I decided to take a look and see what the hoopla was about.
I hope you approach the book as I did, knowing nothing about it. Ishiguro presents us with an emerged society replete with a collective jargon used to describe the social order, the meanings of which are foreign to the reader. As the reader delves into the book, a clue, usually in the form of conversation, is dropped into the narrative which suddenly explains a societal term. Oh! I said to myself many times throughout the book as a puzzling term became known.
I found that exciting. If you read reviews of this book that “explain” everything to you ahead of time, I think the magic of your own discovery disappears.
So I am not going to tell you anything more. Except this: it is such an interesting book and well worth the time to read it. I found myself thinking about the book days after I had finished it. And, once you are done, maybe take time to listen to Terry Gross interview Kazuo Ishiguro on NPR’s Fresh Air. It is always fun to hear the author’s viewpoint. But do that last. Read the book first.