Dystopian story about an island where once something is selected to disappear it's destroyed and forgotten about by the people, and no longer has any meaning. Things like roses, emeralds, the ferry to the outside world disappear from people's lives and those who remember or try to keep a disappeared thing are in danger of being taken by the Memory Police. When the novelist protagonist discovers that her editor is one of those who remember, she looks for a way to save him. In the mean time she is writing a deeply disturbing novel about a woman learning to type who loses her voice. The missing voice and the gradual loss of her world of the woman in the novel echo what's going on on the island but with the disturbing twist of the control of the woman's lover.
It's a really good story but really depressing to read as the people lose more and more of what makes them themselves. It's got obvious political overtones of thought control and political systems which allow less and less to their populations, but I also read a review which presented it as an allegory of death, which really makes sense. Also quite appropriate to read during covid lockdown where I feel more and more that I'm losing my connections to the outside world and the person I used to be. A powerful and disturbing read.

Goes to Lamilla as my RABCK for February.

Received today! Thank you for the book and the card!