The Giver (Giver Quartet, #1)

by Lois Lowry

The Giver was one of those books that I ended up giving a five-star rating without even needing to think about it.

Here's a one sentence literature History lesson; The Giver was first published in 1993. This book was written more than ten years ago and what I found really interesting was that it's still relevant more than ten years later. While The Giver, might not be one of the first dystopian books that were ever written, it's much more original and refreshing compared to most of the modern dystopian books that I've read.

Like most dystopian novels, The Giver focuses on the perfect Utopian society. I couldn't help but compare it to Matched even although The Giver was written a long time before Matched was. With both novels, I couldn't help but have a sense that there was something creepy and dreadful beyond the perfect surface.

So, I'm going to become a horrible person whose compares two books of a similar genre. :( The Giver and Matched are similar in nature, but I will try to keep these comparisons as subtle as possible.

In the Matched series, I felt as though the passive action (the internal or introspective action) wasn't enough and I kept on itching for something more to happen. In The Giver, everything that takes place is introspective, meaning that is takes place within the main character, Jonas. This meant plenty of character development as Jonas starts his training as the Receiver of Memory. And I love awesome character development! The only time that there was external action in the book was towards the end, and even that external action wasn't about action at all. I love action books and books without any action, bore me to death, but Lowry is a genius! There was something about The Giver that was so interesting and gripping that I couldn't stop turning the pages. In my head, I knew that nothing much was happening in the world that Jonas lived in, but I didn't care!

The Giver had strong world-building, great character development and was a surprisingly gripping passive action novel. Definitely, one of my favourites!