I is for Ishiguru

When I was browsing the "I" section of the Reidsville Public Library, the title of this book caught my attention. When I grabbed it, I noticed that the author had also written "Remains of the Day." I was intrigued, so I checked it out. For our "I" stop on the journey through the alphabet, I read "When We Were Orphans," by Kazuo Ishiguro.

"When We were Orphans" is the story of Christopher Banks, an Englishman born in Shanghai in the early 20th century. Sounds good so far, right. Banks is just a regular privileged kid living in a very sheltered area of what was apparently a pretty rough and tumble city. Shanghai took everything from the young Banks. The city took his father, then his mother. Banks was forced to move to England to grow up with his aunt. All he dreamed of was finding his parents and became a detective to do just that. Banks solves several high profile cases in England before bowing to pressure to return to Shanghai to solve the one case which has haunted him since he was a boy.

The story sounds so intriguing, but honestly, I kept feeling like I was missing some inside story. I felt throughout the book that I was hearing two separate conversations and trying to make them into one. While the writing was good, I just never could get into the story. Did I want to find out what happened to Banks' parents, yes; did I care how he found out, not really. I hate when I don't bond with any character in a novel, but I never bonded with Banks or any of the peripheral characters. Maybe it was me. The reviews on the book are great, but it just didn't click with me.