Klara and the Sun
Kazuo Ishiguro
This is a story about bending the boundaries of life, love, and the in/ability to change. Klara is an “artificial friend” – an emotional support type of robot – and the story unfolds from her perspective as she is purchased and taken to her new home. It is dark and dystopian and also light as air.
LOTTA WECKSTRÖM
Language Program Coordinator
Lecturer, Finnish Studies
The Just City
Jo Walton
The Just City by Jo Walton is sci-fi/fantasy about a social experiment involving an attempt to “(re)write the rules” to implement a version of Plato’s Republic, but grappling with issues of sexual consent, the rights of slaves or robots in this proposed new society, etc., all done with a focus on Socratic debate. Highly readable. It’s the first of three volumes in Walton’s “Thessaly” series.
ETHAN LIGON
Professor
Agricultural & Resource Economics