MEM

by Bethany C. Morrow

Overview

Buzzfeed's #1 Book to Read this Spring
A Best Book of the Month at The Washington Post, Bustle, and Chicago Review of Books
MEM is a rare novel, a small book carrying very big ideas, the kind of story that stays with you long after you’ve finished reading it.
Set in the glittering art deco world of a century ago, MEM makes one slight alteration to history: a scientist in Montreal discovers a method allowing people to have their memories extracted from their minds, whole and complete. The Mems exist as mirror-images of their source — zombie-like creatures destined to experience that singular memory over and over, until they expire in the cavernous Vault where they are kept.
And then there is Dolores Extract #1, the first Mem capable of creating her own memories. An ageless beauty shrouded in mystery, she is allowed to live on her own, and create her own existence, until one day she is summoned back to the Vault. What happens next is a gorgeously rendered, heart-breaking novel in the vein of Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go. Debut novelist Bethany Morrow has created an allegory for our own time, exploring profound questions of ownership, and how they relate to identity, memory and history, all in the shadows of Montreal’s now forgotten slave trade.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781944700553
Publisher:	The Unnamed Press
Publication date:	05/22/2018
Pages:	192
Product dimensions:	5.20(w) x 8.10(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

A California native, Bethany C. Morrow spent six years living in Montreal, Quebec. Her speculative literary fiction uses a focus on character and language to engage with, comment on and investigate worlds not unlike our own. MEM is her debut novel. She currently resides in upstate New York.

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"An extraordinary and utterly compelling novel that deftly explores questions of memory, identity, and humanity while also introducing one of my favourite characters in a long time. I loved everything about MEM." —Kelly Link, author of Get in Trouble
“The moment I opened Bethany C. Morrow’s thrilling and unsettling MEM, I could not stop turning the pages. Dolores Extract #1—a "Mem"—defies the rules of her world in a harrowing quest for autonomy and understanding. Her journey generates a deeply powerful inquiry into memory, trauma, ownership, and freedom—into the very essence of what it means to be human. This gorgeously written novel is one of the most enthralling and original debuts I’ve read in years.” —Laura van den Berg, author of Find Me
"In the world of Bethany C. Morrow's imaginative and gloriously written first novel, MEM, a memory might have a life of her own. This novel imagines an alternate past where memories can be extracted and turned to flesh, a premise that unfolds with intrigue and wisdom from this writer's fertile imagination. Don't miss this exciting debut that will change the way you think about memories." —Tananarive Due, American Book Award and British Fantasy Award winner
“MEM is a mind bending exploration of what it means to be human. In this tight, gripping novel doctors have the ability to extract people's traumatic memories. These memories become people, sort of... Or maybe not. And what happens to the people who abuse the procedure? How do our memories shape our lives? MEM is a great read, especially for those interested in the ethics and strange reality of how new technologies impact the human condition.” -Chris Morrow, Northshire Bookstore (Manchester Center, VT) “Staged in an alternate possibility of the last century, MEM is the story of what could happen if we found a way to remove our bad memories and store them in a surrogate. Of course these surrogates would be kept in a vault and only brought out for special occasions, maybe to impress your friends at a cocktail party. But what if one of them – let’s call her Dolores Extract #1 – did not conform to the “rules” of the process. What if instead of only having one memory to live out over and over and over again, like a bad dream, waiting to waste away to nothing and then die, she was discovered to be able to make her own new memories. What then? Well, she might be removed from the vault and allowed to live a life, of sorts, under the watchful eye of the program’s staff. This is a searing tale of consequences. Of unexpected results to a science some might think has gone off the rails. But it’s also an insightful look into what makes us who we are and what happens when we can dispose of parts of ourselves we no longer want around to haunt us. I guarantee this is a book that will dig its way into your own memories and may well keep you up at night with thoughts you just can’t turn off. What a page-turner!” -Linda Bond, Auntie’s Bookstore (Spokane, WA)

Editorial Reviews

12/04/2017
In Morrow’s haunting debut novel, the year is 1925, and Dolores Extract No. 1 has been recalled to the Vault. Dolores Extract No. 1—or Elsie, self-named after a film character—is a Mem, physical beings that are part of a groundbreaking procedure developed to extract memories from humans. Mems store the traumatic or cherished memories that humans would like either to get rid of or preserve. Incapable of autonomous thought, Mems regurgitate an infinite loop of whatever memory they have absorbed until expiration, sometimes with horrifying results—except, somehow, Elsie, who has lived independently for 18 years. She is all too capable of understanding what her recall implies and what her continued lucid and corporeal existence must mean for her “Source,” the original Dolores. There is a flat romantic subplot involving scientist Harvey Parrish, and the revelation of Elsie’s existence might have been better left to the imagination. But Morrow’s debut is ambitious and insightful, raising questions about memory, trauma, and humanity. The novel is at its best when it presents Elsie at her most human, forcing the real ones around her to reckon with what her personhood means for theirs. (May)

Publishers Weekly

"Morrow’s debut is ambitious and insightful, raising questions about memory, trauma, and humanity. The novel is at its best when it presents Elsie at her most human, forcing the real ones around her to reckon with what her personhood means for theirs." —Publishers Weekly

"With her dizzying concept, richly imagined narrator, ornate setting, and first-rate storytelling, Morrow offers an epiphany for readers of speculative fiction with echoes of ideas explored in films like Blade Runner and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. The defiant story of an impossible enigma who only yearns to be a real girl." —Kirkus Reviews

From the Publisher

2018-03-06
A young woman's personality is the result of a startling experimental procedure, leaving her to struggle with the question of who she really is.This debut novel by multigenre fabulist Morrow is a haunting exploration of memory, identity, and mortality set in a vaguely sinister alternate-reality Montreal circa 1925. In this rendering, scientists have discovered a peculiar method of extracting memories from people and delivering them into "Mems," half-alive creatures whose purpose is to experience the memory over and over again in a fortress called the Vault until they die. But not our narrator, oddly enough. The story is told by a 19-year-old Mem who identifies as "Elsie," though her true designation is "Dolores Extract No. 1," meant to keep the memory of a car crash in 1906 from troubling her "source," Dolores Shepherd. But Elsie is a fully formed individual, capable of forming her own memories, the only Mem who's been allowed to live independently outside the Vault. Repeatedly she tells us, "I am a memory. Now I suppose I'll live like one," as she struggles with her place in this strange world. Called back to the Vault, Elsie learns that because Dolores has reached her maximum number of Mems, she is in danger of being "reprinted," wiping out her unique self. Protected by a kindly professor and his wife, Elsie encounters broken Mems, fractured Sources, and a smitten scientist during her evolution into a new kind of being. In studying memory, Elsie becomes even more aware of the damage resulting from this cruel practice. "What kind of people are we if we can't traverse the landscape of our own memories?" she asks. "What kind of people do they become who refuse?" These philosophical explorations ultimately culminate in a disturbing clash between Elsie and Dolores prime. With her dizzying concept, richly imagined narrator, ornate setting, and first-rate storytelling, Morrow offers an epiphany for readers of speculative fiction with echoes of ideas explored in films like Blade Runner and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.The defiant story of an impossible enigma who only yearns to be a real girl.

Kirkus Reviews