Newberry Medal Winner. Suitable for a variety of age levels and reading levels. Goes well with other units.

I can see why this book is a favorite for literature teachers. The tale is well crafted, engaging, and thought provoking. There are so many hot topics: education, euthanasia, surrogate pregnancy, designer babies, adoption, arranged marriage, and governmental power and control. It is hard not to find comparisons to the educational system, childhood, society with the world Lowry creates. Her society has perfected the practice protecting itself from itself, embracing "sameness" while apologizing for free thought. ( )

Jonas lives in a world that many of us have longed for. There is no war, poverty, or family turmoil, and so no fear, no hardship, no everyday discontent, no long-term terror. Jonas lives with his father, who's a Nurturer at the childcare center; his mother, who works at the Department of Justice; and his sister, Lily, who is a Six.
Jonas himself is soon to be a Twelve, an important age because each year at the annual Ceremony all the 12-years-olds in the community receive their life assignments from the Elders. Jonas is named to the most prestigious and unusual job in the community--the Receiver of Memory. There is only one Receiver, and when he grows old, he trains his successor.
Jonas is both puzzled and frightened by his job, which requires him to receive all the memories of their world and the land that lies beyond their community. What the former Receiver, now the Giver, has to tell Jonas rocks the boy's sense of self and turns inside out the life he has known.
Jonas had always thought Release simply meant going Elsewhere, but now he knows what the term's real meaning is. The baby their family has been raising will be (released) killed. So to save Gabriel, and with the Giver's help, Jonas decides to flee to Elsewhere. the tension heightens as Jonas and Gabriel dodge search parties and airplanes, face starvation, and become weaker seeking a better place. Jonas and Gabriel, freezing, starving, very near death, finally see the lights and hear the music of Elsewhere. But have they arrived? Or, have they died? ( )

The Little Bookworm
Jonas lives in his own Community, where people are assigned everything in their lives from wives to house to jobs, where emotions are dampened by a pill and food is always available, where everything is orderly and rules are to be obeyed without question. At the onset of the book, it seems like an ideal world and Jonas does not question it. Until at his 12th ceremony, he is named the new Receiver of Memories. Once he meets the old man, the Giver, he starts to learn of how things were before the Communities and how even a perfect world contains its own horrors.

Amazingly I had never read this Newbery Award winner before. I genuinely liked it. There were parts that I found especially disturbing, like when Jonas finds out what it means to be "released" and the pills they start taking at the onset of puberty. Lowry creates a world here that shows that a "perfect" society comes at a price. I know this is an oft challenged/banned book but I don't think that I would have really understood certain things when I was younger. I think this is one of those books that you see differently as you grow up.

I actually listened to this one and Ron Rifkin, the narrator, does an excellent job. He gives Jonas the perfect voice and creates tension when needed. The only thing about the audiobook was the little music accompaniments to the memories. I found those distracting. ( )

This is one of those books that I feel completely inadequate to describe. The issues related to this book are so profound that my mind is a little boggled. On the surface, Jonas’s world looks so appealing... no one is suffering, no one is ever confused or doubting- who wouldn’t want that? And yet, so much has been given up to make that existence possible that you wonder if these people are really even human anymore. They have no knowledge beyond their own, extremely limited experience. The man known as the Giver has been entrusted with all the history and cultural memory of the entire community. Without the guidance and common ground provided by these memories, can morality and connection even exist?

The Giver is less a story than it is a lesson. Yet the story alone is worth reading. As Jonas comes to realize that everything he has ever known is questionable, what will he choose to believe? I read this whole book in one sitting, spoon-feeding my daughter with one hand, holding the book in the other. I couldn’t tear my eyes away. I definitely recommend this book! ( )