Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro Summary and Reviews
|
List Price: Our Price: $4.99 You Save: $9.01 (64%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $3.75 (click here) Category: Book See more book details and other editions |
|---|
Book Reviews of Never Let Me Go
Book Review: Don't waste your time
Summary: 1 Stars
This is one of the worst books I have ever read. Like many of the other one star reviewers I stuck with it hoping it would eventually get better - believe me it doesn't - ever.
I usually give my used books to a friend or to a local book exchange - this one I threw into the garbage - to spare anyone else the pain of slogging through some of the worst dialogue ever published.
Don't waste your time on this pointless, plotless and extremely boring book.
Book Review: Boring, boring, boring
Summary: 1 Stars
Maybe I missed the author's point or something, but I thought this book was a real bore.Book Review: Intelligent but not quite riveting
Summary: 3 Stars
"Never let me go" has an interesting premise and is a well-written book. However Ishiguro fails to satisfy or even engage. Given the context, perhaps this was intentional. However, I came away feeling that Ishiguro could have made his point much more effectively in the form of an essay or even a short story. The book does get boring / tedious, and sometimes annoyingly so. To be fair, there are a few thought-provoking moments but all-in-all, fails to fulfil.Book Review: Unique and thought-provoking
Summary: 5 Stars
From the very first page, where "Kathy H." the narrator and main character begins to relate her story as a student at Hailsham, the exclusive British boarding school, you know something is different here. The word "carer" and "donor" pops up, and so little by little, Ishiguro intrigues the reader by giving small hints as to what is really occurring in this world. By the time you the reader are enlightened, you are so wrapped up in the intrigue, that you can't put it down. The best description of this book is science fiction, something that is not true, but could be true, as science and medicine progresses and mankind degresses. Imagination and fantasy take hold. What we are missing is the description of the kind of society that would allow this usurping of human beings to occur. We already live in a world where this no longer seems like an impossibility. Using Kathy as the first person narrator, you experience first-hand the students' feelings, emotions, needs, and humanness, which makes it difficult to understand why they so readily accept their fate. However, when I think of other modern and ancient societies, this no longer seems so far-fetched. Woman and slaves who accepted their subservient or oppressed state in life, promoted and encouraged it in the next generation, and still seemed to hope for fulfillment and emotional satisfaction, never rebelling, but living within the society as best they knew how, shows that this is a realistic stance for the author to take. It is all they knew. The enforcement of their fate in this novel is subtle but hidden. The characters are likeable but realistic, revealing human emotions like anger, love, and jealousy. The fact that these are talented and intelligent students makes their fate all the more tragic. My interest was held throughout the novel, and I feel it is one of the most intriguing novels I have ever read. Our book group discussion was most lively and thought-provoking, whether the person loved the book or hated it.
Book Review: Tedious and monotonous
Summary: 1 Stars
This soft science fiction book about people raised for organ donations was over-chatty and annoying to read. The narrative in the first person went into painstaking detail about trivial he said, she said conversations that added absolutely nothing to the book. I can read a novel in a weekend if it's a real page turner, but this book doesn't even come close. It took me weeks to get through the book. The characters are very unbelievable. I kept waiting for some sort of conflict or turn of events to happen, hoping there would be an important conclusion, but one never came. Overall, the book felt like a one-sided, never ending, tedious monologue. I don't recommend it unless you enjoy bland, uneventful writing.