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Title details for Tell Me an Ending by Jo Harkin - Available

Tell Me an Ending

A Novel

by Jo Harkin
Tania Rodrigues
Audiobook
1 of 1 copy available
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1 of 1 copy available
Named a Best Science Fiction Book by The New York Times

"Sharply, beautifully written." —The New York Times Book Review
"Intriguing, frightening, witty, and humane." —The Wall Street Journal

Black Mirror meets Severence in this thrilling speculative novel about a tech company that deletes unwanted memories, the consequences for those forced to deal with what they tried to forget, and the doctor who seeks to protect her patients from further harm.
What if you didn't have to live with your worst memories?

Across the world, thousands of people are shocked by a notification that they once chose to have a memory removed. Now they are being given an opportunity to get that memory back. Four individuals are filled with new doubts, grappling with the unexpected question of whether to remember unknown events, or to leave them buried forever.

Finn, an Irish architect living in the Arizona desert, begins to suspect his charming wife of having an affair. Mei, a troubled grad school dropout in Kuala Lumpur, wonders why she remembers a city she has never visited. William, a former police inspector in England, struggles with PTSD, the breakdown of his marriage, and his own secret family history. Oscar, a handsome young man with almost no memories at all, travels the world in a constant state of fear.

Into these characters' lives comes Noor, a psychologist working at the Nepenthe memory removal clinic in London. The process of reinstating patients' memories begins to shake the moral foundations of her world. As she delves deeper into how the program works, she will have to risk everything to uncover the cost of this miraculous technology.

A provocative exploration of secrets, grief, and identity—of the stories we tell ourselves—Tell Me an Ending is "an intellectually and emotionally satisfying thriller" (Booklist).

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    March 1, 2022

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781797135571
      • File size: 471331 KB
      • Duration: 16:21:56

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • Publisher's Weekly

      January 3, 2022
      Harkin wrestles with the ethics of choosing to forget one’s past in this richly imagined debut. In an alternate present, medical company Nepenthe has been providing memory deletion services for the past 20 years. Clients classified as “self-informed” are still aware they had a procedure to wipe a recent memory. Those who are “self-confidential” chose to forget they’ve had the erasure. A class action lawsuit filed by clients plagued by trace memories spurs the company to inform all self-confidentials of their deletion and offer memory restorations. Harkin tells the story from the points of view of a psychologist working for Nepenthe, a college dropout struggling with trace memories, an architect who discovers that his wife was a self-confidential, a young man inexplicably missing years of memories, and a former policeman seeking a memory deletion despite his estranged wife’s concerns. The author does a good job imagining the effects of Nepenthe’s work while characters weigh questions such as whether or not the self is inherently altered by memory loss. Some arcs feel more emotionally fleshed out than others, but Harkin keeps the plot tight and times her reveals effectively. It adds up to a smart speculative outing. Agent: Felicity Blunt, Curtis Brown.

    • Library Journal

      Starred review from June 1, 2022

      Harkin's debut novel is an ambitious piece of speculative fiction about the importance of memory, especially in a world where it's disposable. In an alternate present, the Nepenthe corporation discovers a way to remove unwanted or traumatic memories, even making sure some people don't remember requesting the deletion. When Nepenthe is forced to reveal to people that they had used the memory-deletion services, they give them the option to get that memory back, which creates all sorts of moral conundrums and strains on relationships. Harkin juggles multiple narratives, from a jealous husband who suspects his wife had memories of an affair deleted to a police officer suffering from PTSD. Tania Rodrigues gives this massive cast of characters their own unique voices, even as the number of characters threatens to balloon out of control. Luckily, Harkin ties all these different narratives together through Noor, a Nepenthe employee who suspects her boss Louise of having her own agenda. VERDICT A fine-tuned science fiction character study that explores such philosophical questions as how our memories, good and bad, affect who we are and how we relate to others.--James Gardner

      Copyright 2022 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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