hannah_and_her_stories's review
dark
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Police brutality, Kidnapping, and Confinement
Moderate: Grief, Rape, Infidelity, Body horror, Fire/Fire injury, and Death of parent
Minor: Dysphoria, Sexual content, Torture, and Violence
theliteratewalrus's review
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death and Forced institutionalization
Moderate: Death of parent and Dysphoria
Minor: Rape and Domestic abuse
beanie_bob's review
dark
emotional
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75
Simply the words “memory police” are enough to evoke Orwellian imagery but the author’s work is powerful enough to stand on its own. The story is strange, unsettling, and devastating. But it’s also filled with little moments of calm and simplicity and domesticity. I found myself generally reading a chapter a day because the writing and pacing of the story felt like something to sift through and consider slowly.
Spoiler
You never get an answer for why the world is the way it is. Instead you learn what it’s like to be a person in the world. Every chapter you are forced to confront loss and fear and grief.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death and Dysphoria
theayeaye's review against another edition
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
I found The Memory Police to be a masterclass in writing successful anticlimax. Before the last three chapters I would have rated this book just slightly fewer stars (maybe 3.75) but the ending brought together the threads of the Memory Police into a hauntingly tragic resolution.
One caveat for potential readers, I think this book is better understood less as a novel and more of a meditation on some themes through a story. Go into this book with the same mindset as taking in a painting at a museum.
Ogawa's writing style (and Stephen Snyder's translation) is remarkably understated and accomplishes a really interesting technique to show the narrator's emotions and feelings in her actions while keeping some aspects hidden. It works really well when one of the themes of the book is which emotions do we acknowledge and honour in ourselves and which do we dampen.
I also really enjoyed the juxtaposition of the main story with the text of the narrator's novel. I think it added a great deal to the book to see how she works through her experiences by writing about them.
I found the writing a really thought provoking meditation loss and grief, and the things we lose without noticing, and the things we lose and notice very deeply.
The build-up of sadness and grief grows and grows until the book's ending. (Spoilers ahead for the curious but I don't think it would ruin the book to know how it ends.)
One caveat for potential readers, I think this book is better understood less as a novel and more of a meditation on some themes through a story. Go into this book with the same mindset as taking in a painting at a museum.
Ogawa's writing style (and Stephen Snyder's translation) is remarkably understated and accomplishes a really interesting technique to show the narrator's emotions and feelings in her actions while keeping some aspects hidden.
Spoiler
Like her romantic affections for R.I also really enjoyed the juxtaposition of the main story with the text of the narrator's novel. I think it added a great deal to the book to see how she works through her experiences by writing about them.
I found the writing a really thought provoking meditation loss and grief, and the things we lose without noticing, and the things we lose and notice very deeply.
The build-up of sadness and grief grows and grows until the book's ending. (Spoilers ahead for the curious but I don't think it would ruin the book to know how it ends.)
Spoiler
The final chapters show the narrator succeeding in R's request for her to finish her novel – a remarkable achievement in the context of her losses, though the achievement comes through understated because of her changing state of mind. And ultimately, remembering how to write does not succeed in saving her, and she gives in to the end with a chilling finality.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Dysphoria, Grief, and Confinement
Moderate: Abandonment
nicolepaul_ine's review against another edition
challenging
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Confinement, Dysphoria, and Trafficking
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