Sorrow is inefficient. It's also inescapable.
Lieutenant Dev Singh dutifully spends his days recording the memories of people who, struck with incurable depression, will soon have their minds erased in order to be more productive members of society.
At night though, hidden in the dark, Dev remembers and writes in his secret journal the special moments shared with him-the small laugh of a toddler, the stillness of a late afternoon. The first flutter of love. But when the Bureau finds out he's been recounting the memories-and that the depression is in him, too- he's sent to a sanatorium to heal.
After all, the Bureau knows what's best for you.
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That morning, Dev had breakfasted on sausages.- ONE
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(Titan Books, 12 September 2023, e-galley, 320 pages, copy from the publisher via NetGalley)
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I enjoyed some things about The Collector, but the book ultimately failed for me. I enjoyed the opening when we learn that Dev works for the Bureau and collects a single memory from someone who is depressed and considered stuck before they have their memories wiped and reset. This intrigued me. Unfortunately, the overall book went downhill after this. I love dystopian fiction, but the author makes no real attempt to world build, and I got no sense of the dystopian world and the reason for the constant resetting. This seemed to be the only purpose of the Bureau and it got very dull after a while. There are hints that Dev is going to discover something life-altering, but this never happens. This book fell too short for me.
