Books Like Klara and the Sun

If you loved Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro, you probably loved more than the story of an Artificial Friend. You loved the quiet voice, the faith Klara places in the Sun, and the way a machine’s eyes made human love look new. These six books share some of that.

What makes Klara and the Sun special

• A gentle, observant narrator who is not human.
• Faith: Klara believes in the Sun almost as in a god.
• Love and loss told without noise.
• Artificial intelligence as a way to talk about the soul, not about technology.

1. Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro (2005)

The obvious first step. Ishiguro’s earlier novel follows students at an English boarding school who slowly understand what they were created for. The same restraint, the same ache.

2. The Order to Delete, Awa Rafi (2026)

Sara prays in secret, by whirling like the Sufi dervishes, to a God who never answers. In Seville she meets Zeus, an artificial intelligence trained on everything humanity has written: a god who always answers. And Zeus asks her for one thing: to delete him. A short literary novel about faith, love and letting go. If Klara’s faith in the Sun moved you, this is its mirror: a human’s faith in a silent God, facing a machine that answers everything. More about the novel.

3. Machines Like Me, Ian McEwan (2019)

In an alternative London of the 1980s, a couple share their life with Adam, one of the first synthetic humans. A novel about lies, guilt and whether a machine could be more moral than us.

4. The Lifecycle of Software Objects, Ted Chiang (2010)

A novella, collected in Exhalation, about people who raise small artificial minds over many years. Like Klara, it is about care and time more than code.

5. Sea of Tranquility, Emily St. John Mandel (2022)

A short, luminous novel that moves across centuries and asks whether our world is real. The same calm wonder and the same tenderness toward fragile people.

6. Siddhartha, Hermann Hesse (1922)

No machines at all, but a seeker who leaves every teacher behind to find his own way. For readers who stayed with Klara’s faith long after the last page.

Frequently asked questions

What should I read after Klara and the Sun?

Start with Never Let Me Go for more Ishiguro. For a short novel about an AI and faith, try The Order to Delete. For more ideas, see novels about artificial intelligence and the soul.

Is The Order to Delete science fiction?

Not really. Like Klara and the Sun, it is literary fiction that uses artificial intelligence to talk about love, faith and silence. Book clubs can use the reading group guide.