Scan barcode
mayareads4fun's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
Definitely surprised me in some ways, I didn’t know what to expect from a book in the perspective of an AI character, but it was really touching.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death and Chronic illness
Moderate: Death and Grief
laurajordensharris's review against another edition
emotional
funny
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Bullying, Child death, Chronic illness, Death, Terminal illness, Grief, Abandonment, and Classism
ellisy's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75
Klara and the sun, a novel about human emotions and the human heart seen through the lens of an Artificial Intelligence: Klara, a robot with both a child-like and an outsider's perspective. It's a book that recognizes the changes and problems in a world that reflects problems of our reality, but takes a more human approach where relationships and day-to-day life are the focus: "The human heart. Do you think there is such a thing? Something that makes each of us special and individual?" Making it a one of a kind exploration where individuals are the center in what slowly becomes a more and more savage society.
This story is told through an unreliable narrator, not because it's trying to trick you into believing in something untrue and genuinely monstrous like in Lolita, but because the narrator both doesn't understand nor know everything. She's a robot configured for something very specific: prevent kid's loneliness. "You have an outsider narrator that paradoxically allows you to focus very sharply on specific aspects of the human world. It feels quite natural for Klara: she looks out of the shop window at the street going past and she tries to de-code it in terms of loneliness, tries to spot it and how people tend to avoid it". Like a child, she doesn't understand much of the world, but is learning quickly and making connections of what she sees with what she is capable of understanding. One of the very first connections she makes is that the Sun is a benign being that not only gives nourishment but also is capable of saving people from death. An idea that becomes very relevant in the story.
As I mentioned, Klara doesn't understand everything, is not programmed to. Even though she's remarkably curious, she never goes out of her programming. Her focus is and always will be the people she's surrounded by, and most importantly, her kid. That makes such a novelty in the genre, not only because it avoids the stereotype of the robot going out of their programming, but builds a world we never get to fully understand, since the narrator is not interested in what usually interests this genre. Normally, in Science Fiction, your focus is politics as a mechanism to get you to comprehend fully its world, and to use this fictional world and the afflictions of its society to warn you about a real-life problem we may be experiencing in a smaller level. This book turns that around completely and focuses on two households, their own domestic problems and tragedy. Takes a smaller scale where feelings and relationships are the focus. As the author mentioned in an interview in 2021, he wanted to question "if the world is changing like this, if the environment is changing like this, then what does this do to us as human beings? What does it do to our relationships? What would it feel like to be in this situation? I write novels to help people swap emotions, not to warn people".
At the same interview, he mentioned that his main interest in the novel is looking at human love and human relationships through the eyes of an AI. The peculiar perspective of such an outsider with a different kind of logic and different assumptions. To which she concludes that "perhaps all humans are lonely. At least potentially", that love is something life-long lasting; and that there isn't something special about a person, but about the inside of those who love them. "He already knew Josie and Rick were bound to go their separate ways, and yet understood that, despite everything, their love would last".
But "how much does Klara understand about human emotions? Is she just labeling them and naming them and finding them somewhere in her mind, or does she herself have these emotions in any kind of meaningful way?" To which I respond that she indeed understands them, with some limitations, but she does. She's even able to have some of them too. This is, most probably, because she's programmed to be a friend, a companion. Which makes me question at what extent humans could be considered to be "programmed" to have feelings too. They developed naturally as a survival mechanism and became more complicated with time, just like our narrator. Maybe that's one of the reasons why I never found it difficult to connect with her, even if I couldn't relate to her completely. Things don't have to be exactly like us to deserve empathy, and that may be a reason why I found its finale so heartbreaking, and this book a failed attempt to be optimistic.
From here I could enumerate some of its other faults, being the main one its lack of focus. It would have worked perfectly as an exploration of the human heart and the way exterior factors affect us and our relationships, but it ended-up adding other half-baked themes that just distracted you from the main idea. This problem is so prevalent that when I finished the book I wasn't sure what it really was about, and it was not until I saw interviews of the author explaining it that I saw the questions he was trying to raise. It's not even like these other ideas were bad, they were very interesting, just didn't work the way they should have. Even the quotes that could be taken for these main ideas are very few.
Klara and the sun shines a light into everyday things we usually wouldn't think about, pointing at the bright side of tragedy and the dim side of miracles. A novel that focuses in feelings and relationships in a society that is more and more practical and individualistic. One that reminds you that "we're part of each other".
This story is told through an unreliable narrator, not because it's trying to trick you into believing in something untrue and genuinely monstrous like in Lolita, but because the narrator both doesn't understand nor know everything. She's a robot configured for something very specific: prevent kid's loneliness. "You have an outsider narrator that paradoxically allows you to focus very sharply on specific aspects of the human world. It feels quite natural for Klara: she looks out of the shop window at the street going past and she tries to de-code it in terms of loneliness, tries to spot it and how people tend to avoid it". Like a child, she doesn't understand much of the world, but is learning quickly and making connections of what she sees with what she is capable of understanding. One of the very first connections she makes is that the Sun is a benign being that not only gives nourishment but also is capable of saving people from death. An idea that becomes very relevant in the story.
As I mentioned, Klara doesn't understand everything, is not programmed to. Even though she's remarkably curious, she never goes out of her programming. Her focus is and always will be the people she's surrounded by, and most importantly, her kid. That makes such a novelty in the genre, not only because it avoids the stereotype of the robot going out of their programming, but builds a world we never get to fully understand, since the narrator is not interested in what usually interests this genre. Normally, in Science Fiction, your focus is politics as a mechanism to get you to comprehend fully its world, and to use this fictional world and the afflictions of its society to warn you about a real-life problem we may be experiencing in a smaller level. This book turns that around completely and focuses on two households, their own domestic problems and tragedy. Takes a smaller scale where feelings and relationships are the focus. As the author mentioned in an interview in 2021, he wanted to question "if the world is changing like this, if the environment is changing like this, then what does this do to us as human beings? What does it do to our relationships? What would it feel like to be in this situation? I write novels to help people swap emotions, not to warn people".
At the same interview, he mentioned that his main interest in the novel is looking at human love and human relationships through the eyes of an AI. The peculiar perspective of such an outsider with a different kind of logic and different assumptions. To which she concludes that "perhaps all humans are lonely. At least potentially", that love is something life-long lasting; and that there isn't something special about a person, but about the inside of those who love them. "He already knew Josie and Rick were bound to go their separate ways, and yet understood that, despite everything, their love would last".
But "how much does Klara understand about human emotions? Is she just labeling them and naming them and finding them somewhere in her mind, or does she herself have these emotions in any kind of meaningful way?" To which I respond that she indeed understands them, with some limitations, but she does. She's even able to have some of them too. This is, most probably, because she's programmed to be a friend, a companion. Which makes me question at what extent humans could be considered to be "programmed" to have feelings too. They developed naturally as a survival mechanism and became more complicated with time, just like our narrator. Maybe that's one of the reasons why I never found it difficult to connect with her, even if I couldn't relate to her completely. Things don't have to be exactly like us to deserve empathy, and that may be a reason why I found its finale so heartbreaking, and this book a failed attempt to be optimistic.
From here I could enumerate some of its other faults, being the main one its lack of focus. It would have worked perfectly as an exploration of the human heart and the way exterior factors affect us and our relationships, but it ended-up adding other half-baked themes that just distracted you from the main idea. This problem is so prevalent that when I finished the book I wasn't sure what it really was about, and it was not until I saw interviews of the author explaining it that I saw the questions he was trying to raise. It's not even like these other ideas were bad, they were very interesting, just didn't work the way they should have. Even the quotes that could be taken for these main ideas are very few.
Klara and the sun shines a light into everyday things we usually wouldn't think about, pointing at the bright side of tragedy and the dim side of miracles. A novel that focuses in feelings and relationships in a society that is more and more practical and individualistic. One that reminds you that "we're part of each other".
Content Warnings
Moderate: Chronic illness and Medical content
Minor: Death
chelly_reads's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Chronic illness, Death, Terminal illness, Grief, Abandonment, and Classism
kriziny's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
3.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Chronic illness, Death, and Terminal illness
nineinchnails's review against another edition
emotional
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
i genuinely really loved this but it’s been almost a month since i read it so i can’t remember why i liked it so much
Content Warnings
Graphic: Chronic illness and Terminal illness
Moderate: Child death, Death, Grief, Abandonment, and Classism
Minor: Bullying
acemummerz's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Chronic illness
Moderate: Ableism, Child death, Death, Terminal illness, Grief, Abandonment, and Classism
rebcamuse's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.25
It means something when the most empathetic character is the non-human one. Klara, as an AF (artificial friend), is even more observant than most, and the lesson is pretty clear (almost from the outset) that if we humans don't observe, don't listen? Then we become rather incapable of empathy.
The book muses upon faith, hope, and love. Klara's faith in the sun is based in hope, but also pragmatic observation and an innocent sense of causation. Josie's mother is hopeful about love, yet lacks faith. Ricky, Josie's pragmatic and "unlifted" friend, perhaps has the strongest faith in Klara as he is able to assist her without really knowing why. Josie is the most human of characters in her determination and courage, but also in her code-switching and mercurial teenagery-ness. Josie's father is a skeptical engineer, but he too has to take a leap of faith in Klara, for the love of Josie.
Ishiguro does not give us all the details. The AFs get only a store as a backstory context. We know there are the lifted and the unlifted children, but we only see the ramifications of that status, not the details regarding how it happens. In this sense, Ricky is one of the most interesting characters in that he represents the folly of societal categories (one is reminded of Dr. Seuss's Sneetches with the stars, and those without stars), as he's clearly one of the most intelligent characters in the novel.
Another lesson from Klara --if only we were all be able to carry the images of our memories and recall them to inform our present understanding. We do, actually, of course, but Ishiguro paints the process slowly and truly through Klara, inviting us to think about our own intentionality and how often we dismiss or suppress our memories because we are not just mere data collectors, but data manipulators.
The ending pushed this away from five stars for me...it felt too much like a saccharine epilogue. We get an explanation of Klara's REAL lesson from the store manager and it all smacked a bit too much of a Care Bears animated special for my taste. I found myself frustrated that the manager herself doesn't get much of a backstory, but Ishiguro has a way of making you accept what he gives you, despite your own desires. In her New York Times Review in 2021, Radhika Jones gets it:
"'Still, when Klara says, "I have my memories to go through and place in the right order," it strikes the quintessential Ishiguro chord. So what if a machine says it? There's no narrative instinct more essential, or more human."
The book muses upon faith, hope, and love. Klara's faith in the sun is based in hope, but also pragmatic observation and an innocent sense of causation. Josie's mother is hopeful about love, yet lacks faith. Ricky, Josie's pragmatic and "unlifted" friend, perhaps has the strongest faith in Klara as he is able to assist her without really knowing why. Josie is the most human of characters in her determination and courage, but also in her code-switching and mercurial teenagery-ness. Josie's father is a skeptical engineer, but he too has to take a leap of faith in Klara, for the love of Josie.
Ishiguro does not give us all the details. The AFs get only a store as a backstory context. We know there are the lifted and the unlifted children, but we only see the ramifications of that status, not the details regarding how it happens. In this sense, Ricky is one of the most interesting characters in that he represents the folly of societal categories (one is reminded of Dr. Seuss's Sneetches with the stars, and those without stars), as he's clearly one of the most intelligent characters in the novel.
Another lesson from Klara --if only we were all be able to carry the images of our memories and recall them to inform our present understanding. We do, actually, of course, but Ishiguro paints the process slowly and truly through Klara, inviting us to think about our own intentionality and how often we dismiss or suppress our memories because we are not just mere data collectors, but data manipulators.
The ending pushed this away from five stars for me...it felt too much like a saccharine epilogue. We get an explanation of Klara's REAL lesson from the store manager and it all smacked a bit too much of a Care Bears animated special for my taste. I found myself frustrated that the manager herself doesn't get much of a backstory, but Ishiguro has a way of making you accept what he gives you, despite your own desires. In her New York Times Review in 2021, Radhika Jones gets it:
"'Still, when Klara says, "I have my memories to go through and place in the right order," it strikes the quintessential Ishiguro chord. So what if a machine says it? There's no narrative instinct more essential, or more human."
Content Warnings
Graphic: Chronic illness and Mental illness
Moderate: Child death and Death
333amreen's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
mysterious
reflective
relaxing
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
The first half was really hard to get through because it felt like the whole purpose of the book was basically just Klara observing here surroundings & so I often thought of DNF-ing the book, but I'm so glad I continued reading. Little did I know how meaningful those observations would prove to be & so the latter half really got me thinking. I think this book conveys a beautiful and thought provoking insight into the human heart, I don't mean simply the organ obviously. I'm speaking in the poetic sense. The human heart. I do infact think there is such a thing, something that makes each of us special and individual.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Cancer, Child death, Chronic illness, Deadnaming, Death, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Grief, Abandonment, and Classism
kellyisntcool's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Chronic illness, Terminal illness, and Medical content
Minor: Death