The Memory Police

by Yōko Ogawa

First published 2020 · 274 pages

About this book

On an unnamed island off an unnamed coast, objects are disappearing: first hats, then ribbons, birds, roses—until things become much more serious. Most of the island's inhabitants are oblivious to these changes, while those few imbued with the power to recall the lost objects live in fear of the draconian Memory Police, who are committed to ensuring that what has disappeared remains forgotten.

When a young woman who is struggling to maintain her career as a novelist discovers that her editor is in danger from the Memory Police, she concocts a plan to hide him beneath her floorboards. As fear and loss close in around them, they cling to her writing as the last way of preserving the past.

A surreal, provocative fable about the power of memory and the trauma of loss.

Reader reviews

  • Josh80/100

    The Memory Police takes place on an unnamed island where whole categories of things disappear and are quickly forgotten. Perfume disappeared and people not only forgot the word for it, but lost their ability to smell it even if they encountered it. Later boats disappear. Then birds - one day they all simultaneously took flight and left the island and people who kept them as pets opened their…

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