This was for sure an interesting book to read. The concept, the unique storytelling, was gripping from start to finish. Apologies if this review is all over the place. I have many thoughts on the book haha.
In this book, we have an unknown narrator, of which I named "Megui" after a friend of mine. We don't get much description of her other than she's a female, occasionally wears makeup, and has longish hair. But that doesn't take away from the story. In this way, it helps us become "Megui" and puts us in her shoes.
The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa
The whole idea that things "disappear" is very interesting. When the Memory Police make something "disappeared" (of which we never find out why they do this other than to be dicks I guess because some of the things they deem useless are not), things aren't actually gone. The objects still exist. People just simply lose all memory associated with them and then get rid of the physical objects. what's interesting, however, is how some people don't forget. They live remembering everything that was "disappeared". It's never explained why some people are like this but it all adds to the mystery.
Like, 90% of the characters don't have names, for example, our MC. I had a theory that at one point the Memory Police decided names were useless so they make them disappear. However, that can't be the case as there are like 3 people who do have names, one being the MC's editor, R. (A letter still counts as a name haha).
I also enjoyed the story within a story. It paralleled with the main story so perfectly. "Megui" is a novelist, and we get to see snippets of her work throughout the book. It's unfortunate for her that novels "disappear" at some point, but somehow at the end, she manages to finish her story, and it was every bit as sad as the actual ending for the book.
The ending itself was so sad. No real conclusion. It was abrupt, like the loss of memory of things that disappeared. She just kinda... died. I thought maybe "Megui" would figure out a way to remember things, or figure why/how the Memory Police make people forget things, but she didn't. She just lived her life until she forgot about her entire self.
Yoko Ogawa
As a side note, I did notice a few inconsistencies. One of them being on things that had already disappeared. Like, photos disappear at one point, but there is a time when "Megui" and the old man are being ID checked by the Memory Police. "Megui" mentions that the police are checking the identification that has photographs on them, but how does that work if they had disappeared in an earlier scene? Like, they burn everything that has an association to do with the thing that disappeared.
That being said, while I didn't particularly like how it ended, I'm not mad at the book. I actually really enjoyed it. It was an easy and fast read and I highly recommend it.
