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A review by neuro_chef
Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro
challenging
dark
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.5
I’m very conflicted with this book
The book is written from the perspective of a robot, and with a book so focused on what it means to be human and how to love, a robot would be a funny choice for a protagonist but it works really well as it offers a fresh and somewhat objective perspective on such innate feelings and emotions, leading the reader to truly reflect on these matters and ideas, and examine them within ourselves and our lives.
The protagonist is very passive within the context of the story, which makes it so that, even though the story is in the first-person, we get a lot of scenes that usually only work in third-person. I personally loved the protagonist and their journey but because she’s so passive, it feels like she just isn’t there for some parts of the story, and so I wish she would have become more active and assertive throughout the book. But she is very well-written and a genuinely heart-warming character.
The rest of the cast feels very HUMAN which is perfect for this type of story but a lot of humans suck and these characters are no exception, leaving it very hard for me to like most of them, but I suspect that was one of the intentions of the book, so kudos to the author ig.
The main and most central theme is the meaning of love and how it shapes and defines what a human is, and if we’re special in some ineffable, innate way, and this is explored through the relationship of the second main character (a human) with our robot protagonist and the other humans throughout the story; the different relationships of love they have with her and how they express that in different ways. There are many other themes that would have been amazingly handled if the author just gave them more time. It feels like such a waste to have such deep and meaningful themes and societal issues brought up but not more deeply explored (to give a few: environmentalism and the struggle of activists, the growing rift between rich and poor, how being rich influences the upbringing of a child and their eventual future, the economic displacement of people by artificial machines). These are all merely touched upon and it feels like the author forcefully moved on from them to continue the main story because so many of them feel incomplete and unexplored, I feel that if the author wasn’t going to explore such topics, he should have just stuck with the one and explored that even deeper. It’s important to note that even though I really wish these themes were explored, it does not make sense narratively (considering the point-of-view of the book and the state of the narrator which you’ll understand if you read the book) to explore these topics further, so I can’t slight the book too much for it, but it’s still very annoying that I was introduced to so many great themes and didn’t get to explore them.
The book has such an intense tonal shift at around 2/3rds into the book with a certain scene that it completely threw me off. It was absolutely hinted towards but the type of book and tone up to that point led me to believe that something like that wouldn’t happen, so when it did, I was left absolutely dumbfounded. But like the secondary themes of the book, it felt like a storyline that was cut too short and left me clamoring for more.
The pace of the book is rather slow, and at times I felt like the story is moving at a snail’s pace that I just wanted to skip paragraphs to get to the next story point.
Overall, this is a great exploration of the human condition with a stellar idea, I just think the execution could be worked on a bit better.
The book is written from the perspective of a robot, and with a book so focused on what it means to be human and how to love, a robot would be a funny choice for a protagonist but it works really well as it offers a fresh and somewhat objective perspective on such innate feelings and emotions, leading the reader to truly reflect on these matters and ideas, and examine them within ourselves and our lives.
The protagonist is very passive within the context of the story, which makes it so that, even though the story is in the first-person, we get a lot of scenes that usually only work in third-person. I personally loved the protagonist and their journey but because she’s so passive, it feels like she just isn’t there for some parts of the story, and so I wish she would have become more active and assertive throughout the book. But she is very well-written and a genuinely heart-warming character.
The rest of the cast feels very HUMAN which is perfect for this type of story but a lot of humans suck and these characters are no exception, leaving it very hard for me to like most of them, but I suspect that was one of the intentions of the book, so kudos to the author ig.
The main and most central theme is the meaning of love and how it shapes and defines what a human is, and if we’re special in some ineffable, innate way, and this is explored through the relationship of the second main character (a human) with our robot protagonist and the other humans throughout the story; the different relationships of love they have with her and how they express that in different ways. There are many other themes that would have been amazingly handled if the author just gave them more time. It feels like such a waste to have such deep and meaningful themes and societal issues brought up but not more deeply explored (to give a few: environmentalism and the struggle of activists, the growing rift between rich and poor, how being rich influences the upbringing of a child and their eventual future, the economic displacement of people by artificial machines). These are all merely touched upon and it feels like the author forcefully moved on from them to continue the main story because so many of them feel incomplete and unexplored, I feel that if the author wasn’t going to explore such topics, he should have just stuck with the one and explored that even deeper. It’s important to note that even though I really wish these themes were explored, it does not make sense narratively (considering the point-of-view of the book and the state of the narrator which you’ll understand if you read the book) to explore these topics further, so I can’t slight the book too much for it, but it’s still very annoying that I was introduced to so many great themes and didn’t get to explore them.
The book has such an intense tonal shift at around 2/3rds into the book with a certain scene that it completely threw me off. It was absolutely hinted towards but the type of book and tone up to that point led me to believe that something like that wouldn’t happen, so when it did, I was left absolutely dumbfounded. But like the secondary themes of the book, it felt like a storyline that was cut too short and left me clamoring for more.
The pace of the book is rather slow, and at times I felt like the story is moving at a snail’s pace that I just wanted to skip paragraphs to get to the next story point.
Overall, this is a great exploration of the human condition with a stellar idea, I just think the execution could be worked on a bit better.