Nobel Prize–winning British author Kazuo Ishiguro will release his first novel since 2015 next year.
Alfred A. Knopf will publish Ishiguro’s Klara and the Sun in the spring, the publisher said in a news release. “The novel tells the story of Klara, an Artificial Friend with outstanding observational qualities, who, from her place in the store, watches carefully the behavior of those who come in to browse, and of those who pass in the street outside,” Knopf said. “She remains hopeful a customer will soon choose her.”
Ishiguro received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2017.
This will be Ishiguro’s first novel since The Buried Giant, which was released to mostly positive reviews in 2015. A reviewer for Kirkus called the book “lovely: a fairy tale for grown-ups, both partaking in and departing from a rich literary tradition.”
Jordan Pavlin, Knopf’s editorial director, called Klara and the Sun “an astonishment.”
“It is a thrilling book that offers a look at our changing world through the eyes of an unforgettable narrator, and one that explores the fundamental question: what does it mean to love?” Pavlin said.
Klara and the Sun will be the third consecutive book by Ishiguro to explore science fiction and fantasy themes, after Never Let Me Go and The Buried Giant. His other novels include The Remains of the Day, A Pale View of the Hills, and The Unconsoled.
Klara and the Sun is slated for publication on March 2, 2021.
Michael Schaub is a Texas-based journalist and regular contributor to NPR.
