neverletmego

=Never Let Me Go =

**Week 1: **
Food: Alexa

Summary- Alyssa Our group consists of Alexa, Allison, Jyll, Maria, and I. We decided to choose the book Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. The book takes place in England, in the late 1990s. The book is told from the point of view of the main character, Kathy H. She is a 31 year old carer. A carer is someone who takes care of and keeps the doners company. These doners are made only to give up their organs, and they eventually pass away. Kathy H. meets many friends along the way, and it becomes hard for her to give them up at the end of her time to take care of them. Some of her loved ones include Tommy and Ruth. They soon come to realize that they aren't just ordinary doners.

Questions- Allison and Maria 1. What do you think of Kazuo Ishiguro’s writing style? We think that his writing style is jumpy and confusing. We couldn’t really keep up with it.

2. What is a carer? A carer is somebody who hangs out with the donors.

3. What is your opinion? It is unfair, because who knows they could become a legendary president, athlete or musician.

4. What is a donor’s purpose in life? The donor is cloned from somebody who is sick so they can donate their organs to save the sick person’s life.

5. Do the donors know what their purpose in life is? We don’t think so, because if they did know then they would hate their life and not try to stay healthy or anything. But we do know that the teachers always mysteriously encouraged the students to stay healthy and never go beyond the fences.

6. What is Hailasham? The boarding school Kathy went to when she was a child.

7. Who are Kathy, Tommy and Ruth?

8. What does Kathy do for a living and how long has she been what she is?

9. Based on the way Kathy keeps peace between her friends, what kind of person can you say she is?

10. Why do you think she is this way?

Person B: Jyll The main characters in Never Let Me Go are Kathy H., Ruth, and Tommy. Kathy H. is a carer, a person who cares for the donors who are cloned to give their organs to the sick people, and then eventually die. Ruth is a girl who was the classmate of Kathy when they were both in Hailsham. Tommy is an isolated boy who was bullied countless times and a classmate of Kathy and Ruth. These three main characters have been created to be donors, but Kathy is working as a carer. I am drawn to them because they seem to have strange lives in Hailsham, the boarding school where they attended in their childhood. There are no characters that we do not stand, because we haven’t read a lot of it yet.

__ Week 2: __

Food: Allison

Questions: Alexa and Alyssa 1. Who are the people that attend Hailsham and what is something they can not do? The people that attend Hailsham are clones that cannot reproduces. 2. What is the responsibility of the guardians and why doesn’t everyone like their guardians? 3. How does Kathy interpret the song “Never Let Me Go”? Kathy thinks that the song is about holding she thinks the lady singing has a baby and she holds this baby very close to her. She thinks this lady is walking around and singing because she is so happy, but is also afraid something will happen to the baby. 4. When and why does Kathy play the song? Kathy plays the song whenever she was alone in her dorm room. She plays this song because she has listened to it since she was 11 and loves the song. Every time she gets a chance she has the tape preset so that she can 5. What happen with Kathy and Madame? Kathy was singing in her dorm and Madame walked in and starting crying and then left the room in tears. 6. What did Kathy say was a marker between when she was 13-16 and all of the time before? She said that her talk Tommy separated the two periods of time. 7. Why did Miss Emily always lecture about sex and having babies, if the people in Hailsham couldn’t have babies? 8. Who is Ruth and how does she fit in with Tommy? Ruth starts to date Tommy in this section of the book. 9. Where is Hailsham located and who else knows about this place? 10. When and where do Tommy and Kathy have their talks?

Person B: Maria This book, Never Let Me Go, is somewhat hard to read. Most of us are having trouble understanding what is going on throughout the book and what the author is trying to tell us. We have tried ignoring the difficult language but it is getting extremely hard. Every week we try to put together bits and pieces that we each figured out and put it together one step at a time. We are trying to get through this book as best as we can.

Person C: Jyll Today for the second book club, Alyssa and Maria weren’t here. Allison brought food. Alexa did the 10 questions, instead of having two people doing 5 questions each and then answering them. We did not do much work, since we were still reading the 2/5th of the book, Never Let Me Go, to get a better understanding. We found out that in the book, Ruth and Tommy started to date, and Kathy had used to listen to a song when she was little. The songs name was Never Let Me Go, by Judy Bridgewater, and one day when she was singing it, Madame, her teacher, was at the door crying. We found out that the book title came from the song name, Never Let Me Go.

 Week 3 :

Food: Maria

Theme: Allison The book “Never Let Me Go” has a tone that makes it’s readers feel sad. Personally, I get a sense of depression from most of the characters. I mostly see navy when reading or hearing the name of the book. The gloomy plot paints and abstract lines of navy, gray and dullness in my group’s minds and mine. An example of the eerie vibe I get when reading this book is how the narrator describes how the teachers talk to the students. The students don’t understand the whole meaning of what the teachers are saying.

Summary: Alexa Everyone was present for this week for book club. During this third round, there was a confusion about who was to bring in the snacks and drinks. No one ended up bringing anything in, but next week we are having two people bring drinks and snacks to make up for the lack of good communication. Without snacks and drinks, we still managed to talk about our book. All of us are still having trouble reading the book. We think it is somewhat boring and a tough read, but know we have to just push through it. Each week in book club, we end up talking about what we know. Each week I seem to understand more and more about the book. Having other people to talk to really helps. If I am confused about a part, I can ask someone in the group and they always end up clearing things up for me. I think that is why we participate in book club. As we read the 4/5th of the book, we still have questions that we can't seem to find the answers to and will hopefully be able to get some answers in this section of the book.

Questions: Jyll and Alyssa 1. What do Kathy and her friends talk about? People who graduated from Hailsham and what jobs they had now.

2. Why did Kathy and Tommy go to a second hand shop? -Kathy wanted to buy a Judy Bridgewater tape.

3. What are Chrissie and Rodney obsessed with? -The idea about people having their donations deferred if they are really in love.

4. Why did Madame took their stuff away? -She said it was a privilege and they should be proud since it revealed what you were like inside and it revealed your soul.

5. What did Kathy tell Keffers? -She told him she wanted to start her training to become a carer.

 Week 4 :

Food: Maria

Questions: Allison and Alexa 1. Why did the kids move to The Cottages? Because they pretty much graduated from Hailsham. 2. What did the kids do once they got to The Cottages? We think that The Cottages are like college but without the school part, so they party and have sex. 3. What’s Ruth and Tommy’s relationship status as of right now? They are back together right now because of Kathy. 4. What kind of person is Kathy? Kathy is like the Dr. Phil of the group. 5. What is happening at Hailsham right now? We don’t know because Kathy doesn’t know, but we assume that the same things that always have been happening. 6. How far away are The Cottages from Hailsham? 7. How did they get to The Cottages? 8. What is their future after The Cottages? 9. Who runs The Cottages? How are they kept in order? 10. Who keeps the kids in order?

Person B:Jyll In Never Let Me Go, the images used are the arts that each of the students from Hailsham made that were taken away by Madame. I thought that it was for the Gallery, where arts were shown for the students in Hailsham. But Madame said that it was a privilege and it revealed what you were like inside, and they should be proud.

 Week 5:

Summary- Allison The novel “Never Let Me Go” was an interesting book with many twists and turns. Some parts were very depressing but other parts were sort of happy. Also, it was very confusing at times; therefore, my group and I had to discuss those parts in depth. Mostly in the beginning we would talk about a setting, character or why people did or said something. Overall, I think that it was a good book and would recommend it to some of my friends.

Person B: Maria This book, Never Let Me Go, was an interesting story mostly telling about the life of a girl named Kathy who went to a specific boarding school, Hailsham. Although this book was hard to understand and not so easy to read, we still had to push through it and get to the end. I, personally, would not recommend this book to others because it didn't interest me very much. And i wouldn't recommend it to be part of our school's curriculum mostly because i don't think many people would like it and/or understand it very well.

Questions: Jyll 1. How old is Kathy now? Is she a carer or a donor? -Kathy is a few years older than she was, and she is a carer. 2. what happened to hailsham? -It closed down 2. Did Ruth and Tommy turn out to be carers or donors? -They became donors 3. Why did Ruth and Kathy go to Kingsfield? Because they wanted to see Tommy, who was now a donor. 4. Why did Tommy hug Kathy first? Why did Kathy pull away? -Tommy liked Kathy, and he saw her first. Kathy pulled away because she sensed that Ruth was in the car and was watching them. 5. What does completed mean? What happened to Chrissie? Completed means to die. Chrissie died after her second donation. 6. What happened to Ruth after her second donation? -She ‘completed’. 7. Did Kathy become Tommy’s carer? She became Tommy’s carer, because Ruth wanted her to, and she became his carer not long after Tommy’s third donation. 8. Why did Tommy and Kathy go to visit Madame? -They wanted to know if she felt that they were in love, since many couples came to Madame claiming that they were in love. 9. What did Tommy and Kathy think why Madame collected all of those paintings, poems, and things of the students from Hailsham? -They thought she collected them to see inside of their souls and see if they were really in love or not. 10. What was the ‘Morningdale Scandal’ that Miss Emily, or Marie-Claude, kept mentioning? -It concerned a scientist named James Morningdale, who was quite talented, and carried on his work in a remote part of Scotland, where he would attract less attention. He wanted to offer people the possibility of having children with enhanced characteristics such as superior intelligence, superior athleticism, etc. He was discovered and his work was put to the end.