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A review by songmingi
The Memory Police by Yōko Ogawa
challenging
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
2.25
The Memory Police was a highly anticipated read that unfortunately fell flat for me. Firstly, I wish I had paid more attention to the 'slow-paced' tag it would have saved me a lot of frustration. Despite being set in such a tense world, with the main character facing such high stakes, the story seemed to drag along. Even when serious events occurred it's as if they barely had an impact, giving a monotonous tone to the story as a whole. This made the book a chore to pick back up at times.
The concept of this story is so unique but not well explored. While the book did heavily investigate how we tie memories to objects and how those objects no matter how mundane can hold so much meaning and function in our lives, other aspects of the story were not well explained at all. Who set up the memory police? why do they not lose the things that 'disappear', how do people join the memory police? What makes the things disappear? Why is it dangerous to remember things that disappear? None of these questions are answered, and due to this, I feel like the message of this book was not effectively conveyed to me, all the insight I gained from this book feels quite shallow. It felt like the book was continuously building up to a grand event which never came.
I did enjoy seeing the main character's writing inserted into the book, in fact, I was more invested in the story being told there than in the book itself, but these sections were far too long and could have been cut short to develop the main story more. Also, I can't buy that the main character was able to write a coherent end to her novel considering she no longer had her right arm or her memories of novels. It is just another way the storytelling falls short.
Speaking of the characters, I don't the character writing was anything spectacular but the bond between the characters is what made the book bearable. I especially liked seeing the bond between the old man and the main character, it was very heartwarming. However, this is where my positives end.
Overall this book feels like one big missed opportunity.
The concept of this story is so unique but not well explored. While the book did heavily investigate how we tie memories to objects and how those objects no matter how mundane can hold so much meaning and function in our lives, other aspects of the story were not well explained at all. Who set up the memory police? why do they not lose the things that 'disappear', how do people join the memory police? What makes the things disappear? Why is it dangerous to remember things that disappear? None of these questions are answered, and due to this, I feel like the message of this book was not effectively conveyed to me, all the insight I gained from this book feels quite shallow. It felt like the book was continuously building up to a grand event which never came.
I did enjoy seeing the main character's writing inserted into the book, in fact, I was more invested in the story being told there than in the book itself, but these sections were far too long and could have been cut short to develop the main story more. Also, I can't buy that the main character was able to write a coherent end to her novel considering she no longer had her right arm or her memories of novels. It is just another way the storytelling falls short.
Speaking of the characters, I don't the character writing was anything spectacular but the bond between the characters is what made the book bearable. I especially liked seeing the bond between the old man and the main character, it was very heartwarming. However, this is where my positives end.
Overall this book feels like one big missed opportunity.