Never Let Me Go

I found this novel to be the most relatable of those read in the course thus far. While reading this novel, I felt like I was sitting down for a coffee with an old friend and reminiscing over childhood stories and important events throughout our lives. That style is effective for me because I feel involved with the story, and it makes me eager to read.

The characters weren’t heroic, or unusual at first glance. They experienced regret and wished to fix the mistakes that had been made in their childhood. The three main characters do not feel like they fit into society, and band together and attempt to create some normalcy in their otherwise abnormal life.

The Guardian review gave high praise of Ishiguro’s novel, saying,

"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."

I agree with this statement. Never Let Me Go creates characters that the reader is sympathetic to. Most readers know of someone who is irritable and irritating like Ruth, decent and caring Tommy with his outbursts of unexplained rage, or Kathy, who is sensible and sympathetic. The reader becomes intensely involved in their lives and cares about the outcome. That involvement, doubled with the topics of struggle and regret creates a story that keeps the reader in their toes and edge of their seats.