On a remote island, things start disappearing. It normally happens at night - you wake up and can feel that something has disappeared overnight. Sometimes it's little things you barely notice, sometimes it's whole species. On the island, an unnamed woman is trying to continue her life as a novelist, when she finds out her editor can remember everything that's disappeared and is in danger from the Memory Police. She steps in to hide him, risking her own life, as she tries to make sense of the disappearances around her.

The Memory Police is a hauntingly chilling and creepily quiet novel, where all the things that alarm you are so normalised, so accepted. On top of that, you get the sense that when the disappearances started on this island, the changes in society that lead to the Memory Police being in charge and being able to act the way they did were so gradual that the inhabitants of the island would never see it coming. 

The way Ogawa describes the disappearances is terrifyingly brilliant. How you can go from knowing what a bird is to not being able to even think of the word, to picture the animal. And it begs so many follow on questions: what is happening off the island? Are disappearances happening there too? Surely birds can't just disappear from one island? What about migration? They'd fly over at some point if they existed elsewhere?

But the events of this novel are so localised to this island that it's almost as if nowhere else exists, nowhere else is of importance. You don't care about anywhere else. You care about this woman, the old man, and R.

The names of these characters are off too. R, just a letter? What does it stand for? Is that his full name? Why call him R and yet just call the old man 'the old man'? There is one point where the woman gives the Memory Police his name, so he does have one. But she just says 'I gave them his name.' So why know it and call him 'the old man'? Why does no one call her by a name? It's a weird thread of the book that is never addressed but adds to the atmosphere of mystery and intrigue, of things losing their names and identities.

As the main character is a novelist, we get snippets of her current manuscript interspersed throughout, and it's beautifully representative of how the author (the young woman, not Ogawa) is transferring her feelings about the disappearances into her novel. It's like an extra story within a story. 

This is 100% one of those that stays with you, and makes you ponder about all our memories and the things we forget, but also about the presence of the Memory Police in this book. Dystopian to the core, it's one thing to take objects away from people, but to make them forget all their memories too? It's really very heartbreaking to read.

This was originally published in 1994,.............I was so looking forward to read The Memory Police by Yōko Ogawa, and Stephen Snyder the Translator.
However, it did not grab me like other books I have read recently. It took me several days and attempts to read it. I've never read a book that has been so hard to write a review for and how I felt. This book is set in a remote island where things around everyone is disappearing. Items that you see everyday, to living animals, birds, to flowers, roses and plants then to sentinel objects to you, hats, perfume, calendars, etc these are manifested in a physical purge of the objects as well as a psychological absence in the island’s residents’ memories. They have just disappeared and not to be seen or talked about again. Within, time these items never existed! People woke up and they were never there.
However, some people did remember these items and have the ability to remember them. They had to hide the items from others and only get the items out in secret. No one must know they have them! If caught they would be Punished by the Memory Police!

This book was a strange one........However, you can relate to this in life now a days..........things are slowly disappearing from around us.

Would I recommend it.......Hmmmmmmm Maybe! It was one of the weirdest and hardest books I have read in a long time. But, glad I did.

Big Thank you to Random House U.K. Vintage Publishing for an eARC via NetGalley of ‘The Memory Police’ by Yoko Ogawa, in exchange for an honest review. It has been translated from the Japanese by Stephen Snyder.

Dystopian novel, set on a remote island, about the value of memory. The poetic and atmospheric writing is enchanting.

I absolutely loved Yoko Ogawa’s The Housekeeper and the Professor so I was excited to pick up The Memory Police. On an unnamed Japanese island, things are disappearing. The items in question don’t necessarily physically disappear but they are completely erased from the memories of the residents, leaving only a sense that things have changed. The mysterious Memory Police enforce the disappearances, and as they escalate their activities, the heroine, a novelist, decides to hide her editor, one of a few residents who retain their memories, in her house. Ogawa builds a real sense of unease through the novel – there’s no explanation for who the Memory Police are or why things are disappearing or why it keeps snowing on the island long after Spring should have arrived. Neither the characters nor the locations are named and the anonymity adds to the unsettling atmosphere she creates. As I read, I kept waiting for something big to happen, for there to be real consequences to the disappearances, but the residents just silently reshape their lives around the voids left behind, no matter how personal their connections to what has disappeared. An eerie and atmospheric novel with a haunting ending that will leave readers thinking about the purpose of stories and the nature of memory.

My thanks to Random House U.K. Vintage Publishing for an eARC via NetGalley of ‘The Memory Police’ by Yoko Ogawa, in exchange for an honest review. It has been translated from the Japanese by Stephen Snyder.

This is a strange, rather whimsical, dystopian tale that becomes increasingly surreal as it progresses.

It is set on an unnamed island where various things are disappeared from society. As one character explains these were “Transparent things, fragrant things … fluttery ones, bright ones … wonderful things you can’t possibly imagine.” When this happens things don’t cease to exist but they lose all meaning. The island populace instinctively knows to immediately discard any remnants in their possession and their memories quickly fade until the item is completely removed from the collective memory.

It’s a strange premise though after a few examples such as hats, perfume, birds and roses we understand how this process happens even if not why. Birds still physically exist though are no longer recognised when seen and all references to them are destroyed. Earlier, we learn that when perfume disappeared the island inhabitants poured away all their perfume. It seems almost as though they are automatons without free will.

A few people are able to retain their memories but they are taken away by the dreaded Memory Police. There is also a resistance that hides people from the Memory Police though at great risk to themselves.

The novel is narrated by an unnamed young woman who makes her living as a novelist. Her mother was one of those rare individuals who retained memory and tried to reawaken these in her daughter. We learn that she died while in the custody of the Memory Police. When our narrator learns that her editor, R, has memories of the disappeared items and is in danger of discovery as he is finding it increasingly difficult to conceal his memories, she undertakes to hide him.

Throughout the narrative there are excerpts from her latest novel about a young woman who is imprisoned by her typing teacher after he renders her mute. This story within a story is a dark fairytale reminiscent of John Fowles’ ‘The Collector’. Overall this novel with its totalitarian regime and compliant population joins the lineage of ‘1984’ and ‘Fahrenheit 451’.

‘The Memory Police’ is also a testimony to the richness of world literature and has a timeless, universal feel to it. I was surprised to find that it had been originally published in 1994 in Japan and only just been published in English for the first time.

I read that Ogawa had been profoundly moved by ‘The Diary of Anne Frank’ when she was a teenager and eventually transmuted her imagining of what Anne had experienced into ‘The Memory Police’. Certainly the descriptions of the constraints of living in cramped hiding places does convey a powerful sense of claustrophobia.

The novel has left me in a deeply contemplative and slightly melancholic mood. While certainly dystopian it is also an existential meditation on the nature of memory and the self. An allegory that has deep relevance in today’s world where surveillance and authoritarian regimes are on the rise.

The cover art is very striking and even more so after I had finishing reading.

Highly recommended.

Love love LOVED this. Slightly terrified by it given current events around the world but nevertheless, hugely enjoyable. It reminded me in its quietness of Miss Smilla's Feeling For Snow, and the spare language of Lullaby by Leila Slimani (which I didn't love really but liked the writing style). Can't wait to read more from Yoko Ogawa!

This is a dystopian novel set in an unnamed island where nearly every day certain things, objects or living beings disappear totally, leaving the inhabitants with absolutely no memory of them. The author uses simple, plain prose with some poetic -even lyrical- moments in order to narrate an Orwellian story where an oppressing institution, the titular Memory Police, makes sure that there is nothing left for the people to remember the "disappeared" entities. I mostly enjoyed the book, which was first published in 1994 and now translated in English for the first time, but even though it is a relatively short-length novel, I couldn't help feeling a bit bored in some parts that seemed to be a bit dull. There are some pretty interesting insights on the subjects of the nature of human memory and its relation with reality and the importance of the recollective experience in the structure of the individual's identity and sense of self. Furthermore, Yoko Ogawa outlines with great skillfulness the oppressive nature of a dictatorship giving the book a more political dimension. I would honestly give "The Memory Police" 4 stars out of five if the plot was stronger and more engaging, though I understand that the author's priority is not an intricate plot, but raising crucial questions regarding existential human problems. I believe that this is a book that will appeal more to the fans of the literary fiction genre rather than those of crime/mystery fiction.

Hat, ribbon, bird, rose. To the people on the island, a disappeared thing no longer has any meaning. It can be burned in the garden, thrown in the river or handed over to the Memory Police. Soon enough, the island forgets it ever existed.

When a young novelist discovers that her editor is in danger of being taken away by the Memory Police, she desperately wants to save him. For some reason, he doesn’t forget, and it’s becoming increasingly difficult for him to hide his memories. Who knows what will vanish next?

The Memory Police is a beautiful, haunting and provocative fable about the power of memory and the trauma of loss, from one of Japan’s greatest writers.

This is a very lyrical and whimsical book and I really enjoyed reading it. This book is beautifully written and so thought provoking.
This book was a refreshing.
I give this book 4 stars and highly recommend.

The Memory Police is a poetic, hypnotic, gentle novel that begins as a surveillance-state dystopia, and ends as something more existential, a surreal meditation on our sense of self.

First published in Japan 25 years ago and newly available in English translation, the novel has a timeless feel. The inhabitants of an unnamed island, living under an oppressive regime, experience a form of collective, gradual, amnesia. Upon waking, a seemingly random item - roses, birds, boats - will begin to fade from their minds. They must ensure the item's complete erasure by purging all evidence of its existence from the world. The Memory Police are there to crush any feeble resistance, but most people drift along with passive complaisance. What's the point in clinging to something you can't remember?

A small number of people are immune to the phenomenon. They, who alone are cursed with complete memories of all that has been lost, pose a threat to the regime and must conceal their outsider status at all costs.

The plot, such as it is, concerns a woman's efforts to hide one of these individuals in a purpose-built annex under her floorboards, in a manner reminiscent of The Diary of Anne Frank. Meanwhile the 'forgettings' accelerate, becoming more and more extreme.

This is a quiet, serene, personal sort of apocalypse, where attempts at resistance are small, and culminating in the very destruction of the self. I also recently read Revenge by the same author, and a quote from that book applies perfectly to this one:

"The prose was unremarkable, as were the plot and characters, but there was an icy current running under her words, and I found myself wanting to plunge into it again and again."

A powerful, resonant allegory and that icy current make this a memorable read. 4 stars.

This is not an easy book or a summer read. It's weird, poetic and often dreamy.
We don't know a lot about the setting, we just know things happen and you cannot help feeling for the characters.
i loved the style of writing as much as I loved the character development. I read it slowly because it's full of food for thought and I wanted to reflect on what I was reading.
It's being an engaging reading experience, recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine.

3.5 stars, rounded up.
Even several days after finishing this book I'm still not quite sure how I feel about it. It's set on a remote island where things are disappeared. Birds, hats, roses all cease to exist as people wake up and they then have a short time to destroy any they still possess. In time it's like these things never existed at all. There are some people however who retain the ability to remember about them, there are also some who try and keep disappeared things. And it is the job of the Memory Police to track these people down and punish them.
Our main protagonist is a young unnamed author who discovers that her, also unnamed, editor is one who remembers and is in danger of being taken. With the assistance of her friend, an unnamed old man, she helps her editor hide. As life gets harder as food and other necessary things get scarcer, and with so many more things being disappeared, can our trio of heroes survive the test of the time?
My first concern with this book is that there is no explanation for actually why things get disappeared. All we know is that the book is set on a remote island with no contact with outside, especially since the ferry was disappeared. Who decides what goes and when and to what ultimate end? There are obviously repercussions to every disappearance, especially the ones after calendars are taken but I really struggled with accepting the concept without understanding it fully. Maybe it was obvious to others, maybe I missed some key things during reading - but, if so, they were quite well hidden and maybe a bit too subtle. I get that it's about memories and possibly about materialism and, definitely, about the human condition but I think I might have missed the overall point.
The ending also fizzled out a bit for me and I was left a bit unfulfilled. That said, the journey getting there was good, the writing, the characters and their stories did hold my attention. As did the "book within the book" which ran well alongside the main narrative.
As with all good translations, I have nothing to say about the translator as, to use my usual analogy, like a good sport referee, if you don't notice their existence, they've done a good job.
My thanks go to the Publisher and Netgalley for the chance to read this book.

This is a dystopian fantasy, with an almost fairy tale or dreamlike feel to the story and writing. On an island that is probably part of Japan (though this is never explicitly stated) every once in a while something is 'disappeared'. When this happens the residents of the island wake up to find that all memory and meaning of the disappeared item (a hat, perfume, roses, et cetera) is gone from their heads, and when they encounter the physical item they feel very uneasy and have an overwhelming compulsion to be rid of the thing by burning it, washing it away down the river or in the sea... But not everyone has the same reaction to disappeared items. There are a few people that do not seem to be affected, and their memories of everything remain intact. These are the people that the Memory Police are interested in. The Memory Police are a military group that patrol the streets in their uniforms and green trucks, rounding up people who didn't forget, and once those people are picked up they are usually never seen again.

A strange little story that is beautifully written but is also very, very sad.

This is a lyrical, whimsical book suffused with sweetness. A young novelist lives on an island where, on a regular basis, items are ‘disappeared’. Residents wake up one morning to know that something has gone - one day hats no longer exist, another day birds. They know they must dispose of any of these objects at once, to avoid the attention of the Memory Police, who closely monitor the island and wipe out any trace of disappeared objects.

But the novelist learns that not everybody forgets. Some people seem able to remember everything that has been disappeared - and when one of these people turns out to be her own editor, she puts everything at risk to help him evade the Memory Police.

Beautifully written and haunting in tone, this is a bittersweet book.

On an unnamed island, everyday things are slowly disappeared by the memory police as our narrator, a young novelist and her friend, old man find ways to cope, not only with the disappearances but also with forgetting these things ever existed. Those few, like our narrator’s editor, whose memories remain intact, are taken away by the police, never to be seen again. Only the narrator decides to help her editor.

The Memory Police is a quiet, contemplative dystopia of every day. It may allude to an authoritarian/ totalitarian regime behind the disappearances but we are never told about the goals of the police and there is no discontent or rebellion. There is only compliance and learning to live without. In this, I found The Memory Police rather refreshing. It is more of a meditation on memory, identity, freedom and the self. It is also somewhat unsettling. Interspersed within the chapters about our narrator’s everyday life are chapters of her novel, in which another woman has lost her voice. As novels themselves are disappeared, our narrator struggles to finish hers. In this struggle she reveals that missing memories are like holes in her heart.

At the same time, I thought The Memory Police a good book but not wholly convincing and was left with many questions. For example, early on, we are told that ferry – means of getting off the island had been disappeared long before yet the narrator will occasionally still use the word “ferry” (Ogawa’s quotation marks) even though to her it shouldn’t have any meaning whatsoever. Things from nature also disappear but whether birds and roses disappeared or these disappearances were something like mind control of the islanders is unexplained. Ogawa’s purpose was to give us the long term effects of a repressive regime on ordinary individuals, in which she succeeded beautifully but I still found myself wanting to see more of a bigger picture.

Three and a half stars.

My thanks to Netgalley, Random House UK, Vintage Publishing and Harvill Secker for the opportunity to read The Memory Police.

Yoko Ogawa's books are really different from each other and that's what I love about her writing. She's very capable of changing her style and still write a gripping story.
This is a dystopian book. We're in a state where there's extreme control by the Memory Police and people start to forget their memories gradually. In the end, it comes to the point that people don't remember anything and can't even escape the island. Few people manage to prevent this loss, but they are also under the threat of Memory Police reaching them.

The book is very interesting and thought provoking. It makes you put yourself in those shoes and figure out what you'd do. I really enjoyed it and would recommend it.

Thanks a lot to NetGalley and the publisher for this copy in exchange for an honest review.

This was a random find on here but it intrigued me. I don't think I've ever read anything like this before. I was interested in why things disappeared. Who the Memory Police was.
Although I got into this pretty quickly I did find myself not losing interest but I found myself just not feeling it.
I was struggling to want to read this. I took a couple of days break hoping it would help but it made it worse for me. I found myself lost and not caring.
I ended up DNFing at 62% I just felt myself going into a reading slump and I didn't want that. Maybe I'll give it a go in audiobook format one day.

On a secret island with no name, things are slowly disappearing — hats, ribbons , roses, birds. Residents discard these items and have no recollection of them — they tend to forget them entirely. However if you are a resident who cannot get rid and forget about it, a secret police — the memory police will come and find you to uphold their mission to ensure that the disappeared remains forgotten. The are determined to ensure that all memories and identities vanish in order to prevent them from disturbing the resident’s peace of mind.

Amongst the residents is a novelist. Concerned that her editor who is struggling to forget and hide his memories will be taken away by the memory police, she attempts to hide him under the floorboards of her home, and preserve whatever they can as a way to keep the past alive.

A fable and metaphor about the significance of memory and what it means to us, it brings home the trauma of loss and gives us space to reflect and contemplate. Poignant, poetic and nostalgic, it will make you appreciate the small things in life.

This book works on a number of levels. A lot of other reviews pick up on the dystopian elements, and the authoritarianism of the Memory Police themselves, comparing the novel to Fahrenheit 451, 1984 or our own global lurch to the right, and that element is definitely there, but I found it resonated for me on a quieter, more personal level. Maybe due to circumstances in my own life, I couldn't escape the idea that the set up of the book is a metaphor for dementia, and the gradual erasure of self that brings about. It's full of lovely turns of phrase and poetic imagery (the rose petals in the river!), but it's an unsettling read, one that has lingered in my mind for several days after finishing.

I really enjoyed this book.

A vision into a state under extreme control by the Memory Police where gradually things disappear from the memories of the world, for example, no memory of ferries means no-one can escape the island.

A few people escape the memory losses - however they themselves are at danger of being removed by the Memory Police and need to seek hiding places.

The book makes you question the things around you, and you will try and imagine yourself in the same situation! What would it be like if we didn't have books? If you didn't have a voice, would you still be you? Thought provoking and a recommended read.

This is a strange and unsettling story in which our protagonist tries to survive in a world in which objects and memories are continually being removed by a totalitarian regime. It gripped me as a read and gave lots of pause for thought. I particularly enjoyed the story-within the-story, the novel that the protagonist was writing which was really sinister, although I couldn't actually understand how it reflected on the main story. I suppose this gets to the heart of why I have given 3 stars. Yes it's an allegory but of what? For what? I dont know if it was just a bit too deep for me. There are aspects that feel like a commentary on Nazi Germany for example, or North Korea but this doesn't really capture the more ethereal or fairy tale elements of the narrative. All in all, I enjoyed it but I didn't get it.