"'A heart has no shape, no limits. That's why you can put almost any kind of thing in it, why it can hold so much. It's much like your memory, in that sense."' "'Your heart is doing everything it can to preserve its existence. No matter how many memories these men take away, they'll never reduce it to nothing."'

This book was a thinker. Like many reviews say, it is a slower paced book, but the pacing sets a specific and intentional mood that I really came to appreciate. There's a feeling of being made helpless against the slow plodding of time, combined with the fear of what the next "disappearance" will take away, that evoked stillness and tension.

Not everything is explained in this book, and personally I found that made the themes stronger. Yoko Ogawa takes a stance against nihilism and complacency. Collective memory is an important thing, especially if you want to avoid repeating history. When an authoritative government strips away autonomy, takes away your culture and your voice, and encourages everyone to forget; it's up to the people to step up and make a difference. We are each responsible for the actions of the past, and for our future choices. If the book had focused more on what the Memory Police actually are and WHY things are disappearing, I think this would've been a very different book.

While I thought some parts of the book were a little hard to follow, and I wasn't a huge fan of every plot point, I really loved this book. I think it's going to be a great book club read!

"The world sits at a precipice. Our ability to create has exceeded our ability to understand."

I have some very conflicting feelings about this book. So much so that I had a hard time giving it a rating. Ultimately, it ended up being a middle ground book that I enjoyed, but I had some qualms with that kept me from wanting to feel strongly about it. My trepidation was evident as it took me SO LONG to finish this book. I felt like it was CRAWLING by so slowly.

Let me start with what I did like. I loved the setting and author's beautiful world of a steampunk Cairo, full of magic and complicated politics. Anytime the magical beings and rules of magic were being discussed or displayed my eyes were glued to the page. The detail in each character's clothing in order to remain at least relatively historically and culturally accurate for the time all while adding in the whimsy of this fantasy world really worked for me. I struggled with our main character and detective not being entirely accepting of other beings/beliefs in this world, but the more I sat with it the more realistic it felt. It makes sense that she has biases and blind spots when it comes to these new beings in her world, because we all have our internal biases and cultural insensitivities, whether we want to face that or not. I did appreciate that she had her bigotry challenged near the end of the book. The attempt at leaving room for character growth was appreciated. Speaking of facing her own biases, the addition of Fatma's new partner, Hadia, was genius and a breath of fresh air. We got to see that even Fatma has internalized sexism and had to grow to trust that Hadia was capable, intelligent, and a worthy partner for "the great Detective Fatma".

Okay, moving into what I didn't like. My main gripe with this WHOLE book is WHAT IS FATMA'S PLAN? She's supposed to be the top of her class, the most impressive detective; so much so that she has earned her respect as a detective "despite being a woman". Yet, she approaches each situation with infuriating blindness and lack of knowledge. I did not, for one second, believe that she was any smarter or more capable than any other detective or officer in the entire precinct. Was she daring and willing to put herself in danger? Sure! But that does not make a compelling and capable detective on its own. There were moments that I knew I had solved the next step of the case WAY ahead of Fatma and it irritated me to no end. Maybe some might find it satisfying to solve the mystery without the main character spoiling it for the reader before they've had a chance to work it out at least a little bit for themselves, but I should not be banging my head against the pages BEGGING Fatma to pick up on the clues that are in front of her. Perhaps this story would work better in a different format. One where Fatma isn't some incredible detective, but an up and coming detective just trying to make it on the force but they won't give her a chance? Perhaps it's more of a pacing issue that could be solved with a few edits, but either way, I feel this is a HUGE misstep for a detective novel. There is also, of course, the discomfort in seeing a detective work with the police in a way that perpetuates violence against the common people. I did appreciate that Fatma had to face the consequences of those actions, but it was so briefly touched on that I didn't feel the impact of the lesson being learned. Regardless, I don't think the author is "pro-police" or anything of that nature, but I do believe the topic could've been handled with more weight and care.

Overall, I have very conflicting feelings. I love the world building and I would probably read more from this author. His imagination is wonderful and I enjoy the characters he's creating. However, I would need the characters to be more competent (certainly more competent than my dumb ass self lol) and the pacing could stand to have a quicker pulse. We'll see if Clark continues with Fatma and the good people of Cairo!