Welcome to Litsy!

This month‘s book club read. I was down to the wire to get this read so I alternated between the book and audio over the weekend. I enjoyed getting to learn through the AF (artificial friend) and the story has a lot to discuss with today‘s political climate and where we as a society are with technology. I think it will really engage discussion with the book club gals.

What a sad world for the children. Klara's perspective was interesting at first but it grew stale around the second part. I like the hints on how devastating the world has become—or remained—amidst all the progress. I'm not sure how to take in Klara's heroism.

It‘s been a long time since reading Never Let Me Go but there are strong reminders and I do like Ishiguro‘s sentimental sci-fi. Klara and the Sun hints at so many interesting issues (ethics, class, race, politics, environmentalism, etc) yet it completely shies away from exploring any of them with depth. It‘s an enjoyable story, I just felt there were too many plot holes and missed opportunities for it to be a great one. 5/10

For someone who almost always scans the shelves in libraries and bookstores for Ish..., I've actually read shockingly few of his books. I wasn't crazy about Never let me go and I also didn't love this one, sadly. Some ideas were fascinating but the conversations were exhausting to read and the premise a bit lacking to me.

I‘m not sure I understood the why of this enough? Was there backstory I missed on why lifting was a thing? It felt like the world was maybe just different enough from ours that I needed a bit more. But that being said, like always, Ishiguro created this world that was familiar enough to understand but different enough to freak me out about the future, putting me a bit off kilter, which is so wonderfully disturbing.

#audiohiking

Klara, an artificial friend, is chosen by the young girl Josie to be her companion. Klara soon learns the ins and outs of Josie's life especially since she is often ill. Being solar powered herself Klara enlists the sun's help to heal Josie. A tricky read as this is set in the perspective of the AF so you are learning what things are and her interpretation of events instead of them being literally drawn out for you which I liked.

A good book doesn‘t HAVE to have a resolution or message, but it has to leave the reader with SOMETHING.
The author was trying to describe how human love cannot be replicated, even with the best technology…but the message was too weakly presented to be moving or thought-provoking at all.
The style of writing was good, Klara‘s character was okay, but the rest of the characters were more robotic, flat and emotionless than the robot, ironically.

My current read - Klara and the Sun by Ishiguro. I‘m loving it. So far an AF (Artificial Friend) is waiting in the shop window, observing the humans in the outside world and hoping someone buys her to take home. It looks to be a story about what it is to be human, and how humans love and interact with each other. Taken from the unique perspective of a robot built to assist and be a companion for humans.

Inhabiting the same realm as “Never let me Go”, tensions are created through the interpretation of events and world by what amounts to being an unreliable narrator. Ishiguro surprises at every turn; adhering faithfully to the naive thinking of the main character. My only criticism is that the background world is too sketched; Ishiguro forgets we are visitors and, unlike his characters, not born to the events of the setting. Still, a fine👇🏻

3.5/5

Third book read for #AuthorAMonth @Soubhiville Last book finished this month.

Well...same comment. I tried🤷🏽‍♀️I didn‘t enjoy this one as much as I would like. 3⭐️

November 2023 #BookSpinBingo (free space #24) @TheAromaOfBooks
#Rushathon @DieAReader @Andrew65 @GHABI4ROSES

3 ⭐️s
Ishiguro tackles a lot of questions essential to humanity and technology in this book. This is a story that is designed to make you think deeply, not answer questions directly, & I think it accomplishes that. However, every character (not just the AI one) felt like a robot to me. The authorial voice was too detached and unfeeling. The ending was sad, but I couldn't imagine it ending any other way, either. Glad I read it, just not a favorite.

⭐⭐⭐

This is my third novel by Ishiguro and it's the one I liked the least..
The humanity of AI isn't the most original theme and I found occasionally the plot a bit boring; i hated most of the characters, the mother above all.
I listened to the audiobook and the narrator was 👌👌

(I love this cover!! 🤩 the Italian publisher made a great choice.)

#AuthorAMonth @Soubhiville

My favourite male author. Anything by Ishiguro is a treat imo 😌

“..people often felt the need to prepare a side of themselves to display to passersby - as they might in a store window, and that such display needn't be taken so seriously once the moment had passed.”

I mostly liked this, though I‘m not 100% sure I understood the ending. Was it straightforward? Was it alluding to something?

Ishiguro has quite an array of stories. This is my third by him, and Never Let Me Go was my favorite.

But Klara was interesting, an AI designed to be the best friend of a child, and seeing her relate to the humans in her life and try to interpret all of the unspoken things humans communicate, I thought it was well done.

This was a quiet, gentle sort of scifi novel, and I mostly liked it. Some of it seemed a little obvious, and Ishiguro in general never really resonates fully with me, maybe it's the dialogue which feels stilted? An interesting and not entirely pessimistic view of the near future, however, and the parts about how Klara, a robot, perceives the world and stores memories was neat. Read for #aam

2nd book read for #AuthorAMonth. @Soubhiville

At the start I was quite enjoying this and the themes it was covering. However for me I just felt it went on too long, and it made me lose interest in it as I felt it was too slow placed. An interesting end piece to the book. Much preferred The Remains of the Day.

#Rushathon @DieAReader @Ghabi4Roses. 4th book finished in November.

I enjoyed this so much!
#authoramonth @Soubhiville

I listened to the audio and I liked the start of it (after the short bit to figure out what was going on), but as the book continued on, I lost more and more interest. I guess it did end “better” than I‘d expected (for the main storyline that I was (mostly, as far as I know) following). I‘m rating this “ok”. As I read reviews that include a summary, it seems I missed more than I‘d even realized!

I was not expecting to like this book at all. I was pleasantly surprised!

That was an interesting book. Written from the viewpoint of an AI companion robot.

I‘m actually somewhere in between a pick and a so-so with this one. The prose was beautiful and the characters likable. I sympathized with them on a profound level. There were some slow parts and it felt like time stretched on to get through them for some reason. But this book has a lot of heart and the story points to the lengths we go to in order to hold onto hope; and with those we love, we can always hope.

“In the morning when the Sun returns. It‘s possible for us to hope.”

I don‘t know why, but this line made me emotional…

Winding down for the night… Sunny always has to see what I‘m doing when a book‘s involved. I wish I captured the moment he stood on my stomach and peeked down at me over the top of my book lol #CatsOfLitsy

I tried the printed version, then the audio. Plot sounded interesting, but the execution didn‘t work for me, so decided to move on. This one just not for me.

A little me time before bed with my journal and the tagged book… my schedule is so off with my kids on summer break. But I‘m trying not to stress it, especially in this moment.

I had no idea what I wanted to read next… had to seriously fight down the urge to go to the bookstore and buy something lol. So, I decided to be good and pick something from my ever-growing TBR pile. This one‘s been there for a while.

It‘s peculiar that a novel that has an artificial being as the protagonist can be so much about what it means to be a person and an individual.

Ishiguro originally intended the story as a children‘s book. This points out another peculiarity: the fact that children‘s stories often tell us more about who we are, or who we want to be, than other forms of fiction deemed more serious or profound.

I love how lending libraries expose me to books I never heard of or would never pick out. I liked this book because the story line was unique with the narrative coming from an Artificial Friend and not a person. I saw a lot of mixed reviews on this book due to a lot of things are not explained but for me it didn‘t take much away from the story. I basically got the gist of the unexplained and made my own theories.

Not sure where this is going yet but it‘s giving me M3GAN vibes. Sort of.

Loved this, not quite as much as I loved Never Let Me Go, but again Ishiguro has a marvellous skill of dropping the reader into a dystopian world and letting them see it only through the eyes of someone naive who also doesn‘t know exactly what is going on. Little by little you figure a few things out - but I wanted to know more! This time you‘re seeing the world as an Artificial Friend made to support a young teen girl.

4/5 🌟

Told from an AI's (Klara) point of view, about her relationship with her owner, Josie. Klara is very observant, curious and loyal, which makes the ending so much sadder. Overall, it is a story about love, loneliness and sacrifice. It would be an excellent book for a book club because it raises so many questions.

Currently reading

This story takes place in a not so distant dystopian future, told from the pov of an intelligent but naïve robot, Klara, designed to keep a young person company. The book gives you a lot to think about —transactional relationships, ethics, love, loneliness, humanity, the future and AI. I loved this book but I did wish there had been more about the futuristic world beyond Klara.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️½
This is the first Ishiguro I have read, so I have no idea how it compares to his other work, but I was totally and pleasantly taken in by this novel. A lot is said about the human condition, about the difficult choices we make for the people we #love, and about the nature of love itself. All beautifully told through the lens of our non-human main character: Klara, the artificial friend.

What #Ishiguro should I read next?

"Klara and the Sun" was an interesting read about what it means to be human and be conscious with a soul. Klara is a robot who goes home with a girl named Josie. Klara learns and grows and begins to think for herself to help her young charge.

I really enjoyed this sparsely beautiful story about a near future that includes most teenagers having an AF (artificial friend) to keep them from getting loney. A beautiful meditation on what makes us human and the power of hope. Totally recommend.

This is a very clever book. Ishiguro, through Klara, gives glimpses into this future world. Klara is an incredible observer but varies between perceptive and naive in her world view. He offers tiny insights into this futuristic society and leaves much to the reader to put together. Clever.

Lane picked up one of his dad's Star Wars books and asked me to read chapter books with him. Apparently this was code for sitting on the couch and listening to him talk about how cool he is for "reading" a book with no pictures ? #raisingreaders

My first Kazuo Ishiguro book. Read it in June, or was it May? Gave it a 4⭐ at the time, as time goes by, changing it to 3.5/5⭐
About a beautiful friendship between an AI & a little girl who had chosen the AI (among others) as her companion. Love the POV & I was totally captivated & moved by the writing. Was it something unique or extraordinary? Not really, but definitely want to read more books by this author.

#bookreview #booknerdslife

A book with so much heart, soul and warmth.

This book will forever have my heart.