The Story Archive

Never Let Me Go

Kazuo Ishiguro · 2005 CE · Novel · English · Contemporary

Kathy H., a carer in her thirties, remembers Hailsham, an English boarding school where she and her friends Ruth and Tommy grew up shielded from the purpose they were raised to serve. Her quiet memories slowly reveal what the guardians knew and the children did not. Set in an alternate 1990s Britain, it was among the most widely discussed novels of its decade and shortlisted for the Booker.

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Attributes

Genre
Science FictionPsychologicalComing-of-Age
Theme
Memory & TimeLoveIdentity & SelfDeath & MortalityLoss of InnocenceFreedom vs Fate
Archetype (Jung / Campbell)
InnocentAlly / Companion
Plot type
Bildungsroman
Form
Unreliable Narrator
Symbol / motif
The HouseThe Mirror
Conflict
vs Societyvs Fate / Gods
Mode / tone
ElegiacRealist
Culture / tradition
English

Closest analogues