Klara and the Sun
Kazuo Ishiguro
★★★★★ 3/5
Fiction
A sad read—and not just because of the story
There is sadness in the story told. But there is greater sadness from the unmet high expectations from the Nobel winning Kazuo Ishiguro. His Remains of the Day ranks among my all time best works of literature and I enjoyed When we were Orphans very much. Klara and the Sun however fails to reach anywhere close to the operatic highs of his earlier masterpieces. Just maybe, the brilliant Mr. Ishiguro is well past his prime—and that is definitely the bigger cause for sadness. My library copy of the book has been long overdue, with 18 people waiting! I feel less guilty about taking the extra time to read it—the joy I’ve deprived others of (or at least postponed) is considerably less than I had imagined.
Set in the future, but not definitely not science fiction
The book is set in an unnamed time and place in the future: where scientific advancements allow children to be genetically ‘lifted’ and robots have presumably taken on most human tasks. But the benefits, as one might expect, are spread unequally in society. In this world of the future, Klara is an AF—an Artificial Friend—designed as a companion for teenage kids. Among AFs, Klara is particularly observant and catches the fancy of Josie, the kid whose home she eventually is adopted into (bought for?). Josie is one of the lifted, while her neighbor and best friend Rick, is not. Josie is also very sick, likely a side effect of the lifting. Narrated by Klara, this is her story of deep service to Josie.
In this sense, the book has parallels with The Remains of the Day: narrated from the vantage point of one of the servant class, profoundly loyal to their masters and resolute in their work being for the good of the world, but severely limited by their positions to have a true appreciation of the circumstances.
Several sites list Klara and the Sun under the Sci-Fi genre. As an avid sci-fi reader, I can say with conviction that this book is not Sci-Fi. Setting your story in the future cannot be the sole basis for classifying it as sci-fi.
A glorified Toy Story
The book jacket boldly states something along the lines of the novel making “one question the very nature of Love”. The book does nothing of the sort. There are several themes—social classes based on genetic modification; the power of childlike magical thinking; parents willing to try anything to keep their children or their memories alive;—love is just one of them. In the end, this could very well have been the script of the next Toy Story, because what it’s really about is the single minded devotion of a special robot to the child it is assigned to—an attachment that far outlasts the needs of the child leaving the reader somewhat inevitably heartbroken at the end.
Overall
Klara and the Sun did not live up to the many accolades it has received and the numerous summer reading lists it is part of. I’m likely going to be wary of Mr. Ishiguro’s next book—his star has definitely dimmed.