As Kathy tells us her story in rather guarded and inhibited prose, we are plunged in to her rose-tinted recollection of children gossiping, laughing and enjoying a boarding-school type of life, but we are aware all the time that the author is concealing something from us.

Certainly there is a sense of unease that stems both from the dissonance of sinister language placed in otherwise everyday conversation and also from Kathy's unhappiness and desire to cling to the past: 'There have been times when I've tried to leave Hailsham behind, when I've told myself I shouldn't look back so much. But then there came a point when I just stopped resisting.'

However, mystery is such an integral part of the novel - like the children in the novel, we are "told and not told" about the secrets of their lives - so revealing too much of the plot would take some of the appeal away from other readers.

From the start, we are faced with numerous unanswered questions. Why do the students live permanently at Hailsham? Why does it matter that Tommy, Kathy's friend, isn't "creative"? Why do the Hailsham guardians deem it necessary for the students to have medical check-ups once a week? It is this curiosity that compels us to read on, even though we feel that we have partially guessed the truth early on.

Kathy's prosaic method of telling her story assumes that we already understand to what she is referring, so she never feels it necessary to spell it out. As a result, we learn things gradually through the dialogues between her and her friends or guardians and, more obviously, through her own exploration of her memories.

Though the novel is said to be set in "England, late 1990s," it is in fact another England identical to our own but for one vital, uncomfortable difference. The novel is not typical of science fiction, but fans of the film Blade Runner and other media within this genre will marvel at Ishiguro's ability to give such a convincing account of an imagined world.

Using few (if any) descriptive words, England is portrayed as harsh and cruel, and unlike Brave new World, this novel's menace and intrigue comes less from the differences wrought from the fictional creation and more from the discomfort that develops through familiarity with a "disturbing twist."

Never Let Me Go is a story that takes current global debates between science fiction and ethics and, in magnifying one aspect of them, invites us to confront our own confusion. Though never claiming for it to be scientifically conceivable - leaving many credibility questions open to the reader - Ishiguro delves into the issue of how far scientists will go to find cures for diseases.

In our world today - where arguments over the age at which life is deemed to be "foetal" and when it becomes truly human abound; where abortion still fuels massive ethical controversies; and where a recent Dutch law now permits the killing of newly born disabled babies - this novel is all the more important, for it demands us to consider our views about "playing God." As the novel suggests, scientists are investigating how to prolong our lives and make them more comfortable; but the ethics and morality of their research results are frequently overlooked or sublimated to what is deemed to be "the greater good."

But the novel can also be read as an exploration of human behaviour within hopeless circumstances. Initially, it seems as though Ishiguro's main concern is with the ethics of modern science, but gradually, we see the novel modulate into something deeper. Through Kathy's inability to understand the society that has created her Ishiguro illustrates his view that we - humans - live as we are expected to; we do what we can with what we have been given. Whilst Kathy is gradually coming to terms with her horrific existence - though she never truly seems to grasp quite how horrific it is - we begin to understand the truth of the central mystery to the novel.

As in all his published works, Never Let Me Go ends without a sense of resolution on a note of melancholic resignation, but don't be put off by this. It is alive with human complexity, exploring as it does the relationship between love and creativity and the soul, as it investigates what humanity truly means.

In a recent interview Ishiguro said of this: “Love and art - and by art I mean anything that's a vehicle for expression or that gives people a sense of meaning - are two things in life that we focus on because they give us a sense of dignity and achievement. Sometimes we try to believe that they can achieve more than they actually can.”

However, it is not an uplifting piece. Ishiguro makes sure we are aware that despite the students' segregation from the rest of society, they do not group together, but, in a manner that brings to mind the children of Golding's Lord of the Flies, they marginalize and pick on each other. This is also therefore a book about classes or social categories.

Having moved aged five from Japan to England, Ishiguro states he does not consider himself to be Japanese, yet since both his parents are Japanese he does not think of himself as English either. It is most likely that this background has resulted in Ishiguro developing a keen interest in social differences.

His debut booker-prize winning novel, The Remains of The Day, for example, follows a butler keen to impress his employer through his social skills; throughout the novel he talks of his wish to "improve his banter." Though Never Let Me Go does not refer to social differences in the same way, we are aware from very early on that the students of Hailsham are not like us.

Without explaining how they are different, Kathy tells us of a characteristic of all the students: "[You"re] waiting for the moment when you realise that you really are different to them; that there are people out there … who don't hate you or wish you any harm, but who nevertheless shudder at the very thought of you - of how you were brought into this world and why - and who dread the idea of your hand brushing against theirs.'

A bleak, disturbing novel, Never Let Me Go leaves us with much to ponder. The title is also the name of Kathy's favourite song by the fictitious Judy Bridgewater. The cassette is one of Kathy's "most prized possessions," but the title also has a number of other meanings for her: she never wants to let Hailsham go, she never let her friends go, and (as it is explained at the end by an ex-patron of Hailsham) she never wants to let go of the "old kind world, one that she knew in her heart could not remain."

The no-frills prose subtly draws our attention to such feelings, and it is yet another triumph of Ishiguro that he can maintain our interest, whilst never giving too much away. All in all, this is a heart-breaking, but compelling read, which combines the innocence of Kathy H. with something darker and altogether more terrifying.

Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro: Book Club Review

Ishiguro's gripping book will utterly shock you! Never Let Me Go, a mind-blowing novel, tells the story of serene Kathy H. and her two best friends and biggest rivals: hot-tempered Tommy and domineering Ruth.

At the start of this science-fiction novel we learn that the three pals live in 1990s England, though we soon find out it's not 1990s England as we knew it. The book is divided into three parts. In the first, Kathy speaks of her days at Hailsham, a boarding school in the English countryside, where the teachers are known as guardians and the students are anything but normal.

The second part tells of when she moves to "the cottages" for two years, a half-way house where she and her friends bridge the gap between childhood and adulthood. The third and final part is the story of her adult life as a "carer," when she re-engages in her lapsed friendships with Tommy and Ruth.

This thought-provoking read portrays a cruel imagined world; but its true menace stems from the sense that this world is so like our own and that this story could happen. Claiming that it is "unputdownable" is an understatement, but don't expect too light a read. Ishiguro may write with no frills, but the undercurrent of hopelessness is sustained throughout.

To give away anything else would be a shame, since one of the things that make it such a compulsive page-turner is the curious secret that Ishiguro seems to be hiding from the start.