In this Booker-nominated fable, a robot stands in a shop window waiting for a human family to claim her. Klara is an Artificial Friend, or AF, who runs on solar power and has been created as a companion for lonely children – her role is part sibling, part childminder. Klara has a rare aptitude among AFs for observing human emotions, and learns to read sadness, anger and joy in the faces of the people she sees in the street. Watching what appears to be a reunion of two friends, she remarks to the shop manager: “They seem so happy … But it’s strange because they also seem upset.”
