The Giver

A society where there is no hunger, where everyone is employed and happy in their job, no real illness. It sounds too good to be true, and as The Giver by Lois Lowry shows once again, that nothing comes without a price.

The story revolves around Jonas, a 12 year old boy who lives in what appears to be an idyllic community. Births are strictly regulated to 50 children a year, each family allowed to have 2 children, one female and one male. All children born during the year celebrate their birthday on the same day. At age 12 all birthdays stop and the child is considered an adult and assigned a job. Jonas is assigned the job of "Receiver of Memories". This person holds the collective memories of all the past receivers. He was given the memories in a form of mental transfer and taught how to use them by the current Receiver, known in the novel as "The Giver".

The more memories he receives, the more Jonas realizes what society has given up in its quest to achieve "sameness". Jonas' faith in the system he was raised with is shaken to the core in one tragic viewing. The Giver realizes that things in the community are not right, but has felt powerless to change it. Together with Jonas, he devises a plan to help Jonas escape the community and in doing so: release all the memories Jonas has collected over the year from the Giver, and thus showing the people of the community what they have given up. Unfortunately events occur and Jonas is forced to flee without the benefits of the plan when a small child his family is fostering is endangered.

The funny thing about this novel is that it starts out as your typical dystopian novel. There are the people living their lives in happy ignorance until the truth is slowly revealed to the main character and the reader. YA dystopian literature is chopped full of them, Devil on My Back by Monica Hughes, The City Of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau, and Divergent by Veronica Roth are a few off the top of my head. The thing that makes The Giver truly stand out from this pack is "The Scene", and a very ambiguous ending, that leaves the reader scratching their head.

Anyone who has ever read the book will know what "The Scene" is. All I will say about it is, after I read "The Scene" I had to put the book down and walk away in stunned silence for a couple hours, so I could regroup. Now I have read my share of dystopian novels in my time, but never have I encountered one that shocked me like this one did. As an adult who has read my share of dystopian novels, both YA and "Adult", never have I been more shocked than I was by "the Scene". The closest I have ever ever come is the first time I saw soylent Green and heard the words "Soylent Green is People".

Ms. Lowry has stated that she has purposely left the ending ambiguous so readers are required to form their own opinion on the matter. I have my own opinion, but will hold judgment until I have read the other three books in the series.

According to the American Library Association website, between 1990 and 1999, this was the 11th most banned or challenged book in the United States. Any novel that deals with so many mature themes is bound to be challenged at some point. The Library Book Review says this novel that deals with some pretty mature topics is appropriate for grades 6th thru 9th, or ages 10 to 13, or so. But I have spoken with people who read it in 4th grade. At the beginning of the book I could not understand how it could be singled out to be banned, but after "The Scene". I will say that although I would never propose banning ANY book. I can see why a parent of a 4th grader may have some reservations, but for an older child the concepts would be challenging, but understandable. I am giving this book my highest rating 5 stars, not because it is the best written book I have ever read, but because I have never been more shocked by a book.

5 of 5 stars