January 2015 Book Report

When I saw the blurbs for the movie The Giver, I was greatly interested. I love Jeff Bridges. I made some kind of comment on Facebook, and a friend just raved about the books by Lois Lowry. So I decided to get The Giver Quartet and read all 4 of them before seeing the movie. The movie really only deals with the first book, but once I had started, I COULD NOT STOP READING! Awesome books! I highly recommend reading them and THEN see the movie. I’m glad I did. The movie took some real liberties, as usually is the case. Purists will boo. But I still think the movie has value. I enjoyed seeing The Community, even though it was a bit different from the one I pictured in my mind. And as I said before, I love Jeff Bridges. If you’ve already seen the movie, that’s OK. Get the books and read them anyway!! I really hope that they bring the other books to the big screen.

I really don’t want to give much away in a review. I don’t want to spoil it for readers who have not experienced the books yet. All I can do is tell you to read them. You will be better for it. I was fortunate to get the Quartet on Barnes and Noble online with a coupon. Here are the titles in order:

By Lois Lowry -

The Giver (1993)

Gathering Blue (2000)

Messenger (2004)

Son (2012)   

I was talking to my sister-in-law about how much I liked the movie, even though I had read the books. She was surprised, because she had not seen the movie, but had read the first book and didn’t care for it. It does have a very ambiguous ending, and can be a bit of a downer. I told her to read the other books as well. It completes the story.