e342wednesday

One of my favorite books as a child was The Giver, written by Lois Lowry. The book is about a perfect world, also known as utopia. Everything their lives are exactly the same and their lives are controlled by the community. There is no color, no hills, or no season changes. There are strict rules such as their spouse will be chosen for them, each family is assigned two children one boy and one girl, their careers are chosen for them, and when you become elderly you live in the house of the old. There is a speaker system that everyone in the community must obey.
As a child in this community all children born throughout one year becomes the exact same age of just plain one. They must follow silly rules that each year group (ex. sevens, eights, or nines) must obey. The children are given their bikes in a specific year, are allowed to wear their hair a certain way depending on their year, or wear certain clothes. The main character in the book is Jonas a boy who is assigned the most important career in the community. He becomes the Receiver of Memories and The Giver, the previous receiver will give Jonas all of the memories of the community. The Giver is the one who hold all of the previous memories such as color, sunshine, snow, sledding, war, and pain. He must give Jonas all of these sensations but throughout his training he must endure all of the physical pain of each memory. Once Jonas begins to understand how everything works and experience all the happy memories he decides he wants to share them with everyone. He comes up with a brilliant plan which is to leave the community and the memories will all be released to the community. Although they will initially be in a sense of panic and experience pain, their eyes will be opened to their own choices and new lives. Jonas's journey is hard and he deals with starvation and different outrageous climate issues. He knows in the end once he escapes his plan will work and be the best decision for his community.


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