He lied to me a lot in the beginning of our relationship, around 6 years ago. About very serious things like girls, parties and where he's been. The last major lie he told me (that I know of) was 2 years ago. And in the years to follow, he has continued to lie about things he deems as not "big lies" like his phone having bad reception so he can't text or his friend saying negative things about me (when he never did) just so I listen to what my bf is asking for. He demands I get over the past and that he's changed because they "bigger lies" were years ago. It's hard to be in this relationship feeling like I don't know when he's lying or telling the truth especially when he defends his past lies. I also don't know what other things he's lied about. It's very hard to believe I have caught in every lie he's told me. He tells me it's "my problem" and I need to get over it and I'm annoying for bringing it up. I can't find myself to trust him because he's never proved to me he's changed, but demands I need to if I choose to stay in this relationship. He keeps lying, but because they're not "big lies" he threatens me and ignores my calls and texts when I talk about it.
This is the first book I’ve read by the author and his writing is really good, very accessible. The book is about is mainly about friendship, relationships and the ups and downs in them, but for me the narrator (which is one of the friends) didn’t make me feel like these are her best friends and spent a good deal ranting about their behavior. But what I like about the book is that the relationship between these 3 friends seems so realistic,especially the coming of age part of it.
EDIT: to clarify, while I come across as venting, this is a good book which I enjoyed. But I'm not sure it lived up to the hype I had for it (at least in my mind).
==== Overall, this is not a bad book. If I were to give it a rating, it'd be 2.5 or 3 out of 5. The premise is interesting; the over-arcing story keeps the reader curious; and the societal commentary is apt. However, some many aspects of it annoy me. I'l try to avoid spoilers as I detail them below.
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The protagonist's emotional intelligence is highly inconsistent. At times she can tell what others feel even though something isn't obvious (supposedly reading faces), and in other scenes she won't be able to explain why certain behaviors occur. This annoyance is exacerbated by the author's inability to "show, not tell", and while I understand it's a limitation of storytelling in 1st person, it still bothered me.
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Too often someone "did a laugh". Why not say "laughed", or choose another verbs (chuckle, giggle, chortle) that's relevant for the given instance? I know Ishiguro usually avoids using so-called advanced vocabulary, but the expression "did a laugh" was used repeatedly, in a tiring manner.
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The prolonged manner of retelling memories is cumbersome. I think it's deliberate, a way to show how we always have hard time recalling past events, but it either comes across as unnatural way of writing, or unedited (eg. non-chronological in a messy way).
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In the second part of the book, lack of age or indication of number of years passed. A bit like my previous point, I get it if it was set to show "fuzziness" of memories, but it's harder to follow if we don't know whether the characters are in their mid 30s and reflect on events 5 years back, or if they are in their late 20s and talk about events from 10 years back, etcetera.
I'm aware some of my comments might seem like nitpicking, but it prevented me from fully enjoying it. And to reiterate: this isn't a bad book. Just... disappointing.
Last thought: this is the second book of Ishiguro I've read. There is a huge contrast to "Klara and the Sun", which to me is so much more precise in its writing and gives a smoother reading experience. Maybe my expectations were too high?
“Good bi-son”
If anybody needs somebody to talk, well I'm here and I can try to help in the comments. This is a free space 4 anybody <3
