Never Let Me Go

By: Kazuo Ishiguro

Narrated by: Rosalyn Landor

Length: 9 hrs and 40 mins

Publisher's summary

NOBEL PRIZE WINNER • From the acclaimed, bestselling author of The Remains of the Day comes “a Gothic tour de force" (The New York Times) with an extraordinary twist—a moving, suspenseful, beautifully atmospheric modern classic.

As children, Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy were students at Hailsham, an exclusive boarding school secluded in the English countryside. It was a place of mercurial cliques and mysterious rules where teachers were constantly reminding their charges of how special they were.

Now, years later, Kathy is a young woman. Ruth and Tommy have reentered her life. And for the first time she is beginning to look back at their shared past and understand just what it is that makes them special—and how that gift will shape the rest of their time together.

©2005 Kazuo Ishiguro (P)2005 Random House, Inc. Random House Audio, a division of Random House, Inc.

Critic reviews

• National Book Critics Circle Award Nominee, 2005, Fiction
• Alex Award Winner, 2006

"Stunningly brilliant fiction....A masterpiece of craftsmanship that offers an unparalleled emotional experience." (Kirkus Reviews)

"Ishiguro's elegant prose and masterly ways with characterization make for a lovely tale of memory, self-understanding, and love." (Library Journal)

"So exquisitely observed that even the most workaday objects and interactions are infused with a luminous, humming otherworldliness.....Ishiguro spins a stinging cautionary tale of science outpacing ethics." (Publishers Weekly)

"So exquisitely observed that even the most workaday objects and interactions are infused with a luminous, humming otherworldliness. . . . An epic ethical horror story, told in devastatingly poignant miniature. . . . Ishiguro spins a stinging cautionary tale of science outpacing ethics." —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"Perfect pacing and infinite subtlety. . . . That this stunningly brilliant fiction echoes Caryl Churchill’s superb play A Number and Margaret Atwood’ s celebrated dystopian novels in no way diminishes its originality and power. A masterpiece of craftsmanship that offers an unparalleled emotional experience. Send a copy to the Swedish Academy." —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

"Ishiguro’s provocative subject matter and taut, potent prose have earned him multiple literary decorations, including the French government’s Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and an Order of the British Empire for service to literature. . . . In this luminous offering, he nimbly navigates the landscape of emotion—the inevitable link between present and past and the fine line between compassion and cruelty, pleasure and pain." —Booklist

Highly recommended

Are we really so far away from this? I wonder if we would ever value our families so much that we would allow this to happen. Often through this book I thought, "This could never be." But I am not sure.

Regardless of the moral questions, this book is wonderful. The writing is spectacular and the narration is flawless. It comes highly recommended.

Good enough

Any additional comments?

My friend recommended this to me with the promise that it would make me cry. It didn't, so that was disappointing. The story is solid, but slow. It's conclusion is more of a slow unraveling of layers instead of a real climax. Overall it was a good story, but it didn't break my heart.

POWERFUL!

I found this book hard to set aside, you see i had see the movie and it had left me wanting questions unanswered as to the nature of all the inner workings of what the author was sharing. I think any reader of books,one who has a real love fr them should read or listen to this . I find myself asking how would i have handle many situations,and what it must have been like as the author being totally immersed in this endeavor. This book hit chords in every feeling part as well as the question, Is this a reality for some today. As i said powerful and not something you can turn off in your being after the last sentence.

Narrator was impressive

The narrator did a fantastic job with the different voices. She even did a great French accent!

Interesting Concept...

...but just didn't work for me. With the word "humanity" being kicked around in the description for this book, I started it expecting to learn something about me, about us as a society. Instead, I found myself not only not caring about the characters, but not even liking them.

I expected more from this novel and from Ishiguro and while it was certainly enjoyable enough to get through, I learned nothing and came away with nothing from it.

If another author had written this as a first novel, I would definitely not have been this critically harsh and would have rated this book much more highly. But coming from the author of that masterpiece Remains of the Day, I'm afraid that Ishiguro may have set so high a standard for himself that even he cannot sustain that level of writing.

Unfortunately the narrator did little to endear the characters to us. Her voice is a cold, impersonal, cut glass British accent. To make it worse, she must be at least middle aged, while the main character is just a young woman, further distancing herself to the reader.

Weird

"Much ado about nothing" ...beautifully written and narrated but... So unreal (spoiler)...can't understand that not one person thought of escaping.

The shape of things to come

A powerful story that will cause you to reexamine your what you believe about advancements in technology and medicine, one creature at a time.

Interesting story

I thought this book was a bit slow at times but overall quite satisfying! a worthy read.

Good story, I wanted to know more.

I would have liked to have known more about the world they live in and how the society as a whole functions.

Engrossing...all the way to the end.

A sad, funny, thought provoking tale. Highly recommended!
It says I must write fifteen more words to submit a review-I find that silly. But there you go.