An artificial friend with a loving, observant mind is bought to keep a sickly teenage girl company
What it means to love
Klara is an Artificial Friend, a solar-powered robot companion designed to keep children company. From her place in a store window, she studies the people passing by and the movement of the Sun, which she believes gives her strength. One day she is chosen by Josie, a bright but sickly fourteen-year-old girl, and goes home to live with her and her anxious mother.
Who will enjoy it
Readers who enjoy quiet, thoughtful literary fiction about love, family and what makes us human, and fans of Never Let Me Go.
What you will get
A quietly moving, thoughtful novel seen through the eyes of a loving artificial friend, raising deep questions about love, loyalty and what makes each person unique.
Klara and the Sun Facts: Pages, Genre and Setting
Genre
Literary Fiction · Artificial intelligence · Love · Family
Length
303 pages · ≈ 9 h
More about this book
Klara narrates in a precise, slightly strange voice, describing the world in her own way, so readers slowly piece together the society she lives in. Many children, including Josie, have been genetically lifted to improve their chances in life, a procedure that carries risks. Rick, Josie's loyal friend and neighbor, has not been lifted, and his future seems limited. Josie's mother is deeply worried about her daughter's illness, having lost another child before.
Klara notices that the Sun seems to restore her own energy and comes to believe it has special healing powers. She makes a secret bargain with the Sun to help Josie, and goes to great lengths to keep her side of it, including damaging a polluting machine. Meanwhile, Klara gradually learns of an unsettling plan involving a portrait of Josie and Klara's own ability to imitate her. Ishiguro writes with restraint, leaving much unsaid, and the ending is gentle but heartbreaking. The book asks whether love and the uniqueness of a person can ever be copied.
Tender, thought-provoking and haunting. About 303 pages in the Knopf hardcover.
Never Let Me Go
The Remains of the Day
Station Eleven
The Age of Miracles
How to Stop Time
The Circle
We Were the Mulvaneys
Plainsong
Home
I Know This Much Is True
The Book of Ruth
The God of Small Things