Reese’s Review of The Giver

One of the 100 most challenged books list (bookspot.com)

John Newbery Medal

ALA Notable Book

ALA Best Book for Young Adults

Exposition:

Eleven year old Jonas lives with his mother (employed by the Justice department), his father (a Nurturer of New Children), and his younger sister Lily in a society where children are born to Birthmothers (literally it is their job) and then dispersed to family units.

Conflict:

Jonas is chosen at the Ceremony of Twelve to become the Giver. He is unsure of what the job entails and as he grows into understanding through the dreams he is given by the Giver, he is disturbed by the knowledge he begins to possess.

Rising Action: His father brings home a child, Gabriel, to nurture as the child is not doing as well as the Nurturers would like. Jonas receives dreams, which are also the memories of the society, that explain "release" from society is actually death. He sees his father as he releases a child in the dream.

Climax:

Jonas and the Giver receive word that the child Gabriel is to be released. Jonas is unable to accept it and with the Giver's blessing, steals his dad's bike along with food and escapes the society for "elsewhere".

Falling Action:

 Jonas and Gabriel are able to avoid detection, but they are freezing in the meantime. While others in his society have not been able to see color, Jonas is seeing more and more as he gets farther from society.

Resolution:

Jonas and Gabriel find a sled (from one of the first dream memories the Giver gave Jonas) and sled down the hill towards music, lights, and what he thinks to be people waiting for them both.

Literary Elements:

The author uses dialogue among the characters to both keep it believable and to clarify the futuristic setting of the story. The precise word choices assist the reader in teasing out the differences between today's society in which we live and the society in which Jonas lives.

Lowry, Lois (1993). The Giver. New York: Laurel-Leaf Books.