Klara and the Sun

As with other Ishiguro works I've read, the narrative of Klara and the Sun floats me along, like a gentle river. The point of view character is Klara, an Artificial Friend (AF), a humanoid designed to befriend humans and have their best interests at heart.

From the storefront from which she observes human goings on outside the window and arrives at a conclusion that will shape her decision in the later part of the story, to a home in the countryside, after she is selected and purchased by Josie, a sickly child of about fourteen, for company, Klara's point of view is an interesting one.

Visually she discerns the world through geometric shapes, angles, light and shadow. At times, her vision divides into squares with each segment a piece of out-of-place jigsaw, the result like an abstract art work. Despite this, Klara is unusually perceptive, even compared to newer AF models, with a deep curiosity about, and compassion for humans.

Can almost humans make life better for humans? This is an intriguing concept, and the premise begs deeper exploration of humans and machines, AI and its applications, and what constitutes human-ness. Because the story is told by Klara, we are at a point removed from the drama, and the human interactions - especially the scene of Klara's friends at her home - take on a slightly surreal quality.

In the time and age of the story, parents are expected to have their children “lifted” or genetically enhanced but there are side effects. One can deduce that the children are the first generation to be able to benefit - or die - from the process of genetic enhancements. Josie's childhood sweetheart and neighbour, Rick, is unlifted and life for him presents different prospects with fewer opportunities. In the second half of the novel, there is another reveal, when Klara is taken to the city and discovers what Josie's mother has in mind for her, should Josie not become better.

The story reveals information in slow drips. The narrative is leisurely, and though the eddies become more turbulent in the second half of the novel, the pace remains sedate. I had no trouble with this. The slow pace enabled absorption of the world Klara inhabited, a world where creators (humans) questioned the value and virtues of their own creations.

Having read Never Let Me Go, which was sad and deeply disturbing, I found Klara and the Sun to be a more hopeful rendition of the same theme, albeit still a melancholic one. If there is a criticism, it is that there is no central question to be answered, or explored. In NLMG, the rights of clones comes into sharp focus but in this one, there are instead a multitude of smaller questions. The question of what makes us human is explored, but I am reluctant to settle for Klara's touching but simplistic conclusion.

Klara and the Sun is a moving narrative of humans and machines, the latter of which can be programmed to have our best interests at heart even while we humans with our complicated intelligence and tangled emotions often act against our own.