The Giver Summary

This book shows us what a utopia is. In this book there is this community
where there are strict rules etc. If you break the rules you get released which
means killed. in this community the first leaders didn’t like the original world, so
they created a new one, they changed the climate, they removed sunsets, hills,
removed emotions etc. thinking that it would be better for agriculture. In the
community there is a limited number of children that are born in a year, which is
50 children. Every family is made out of 4 members, parents, a boy and a girl, and
these parents aren’t their biological parents. In every family in the morning, the
members share their dreams, and in the evening they share how their day was.
After you are 12 you are officially considered an adult, so you get assigned your
job and you cannot choose your job. Some of the jobs are birthmother, engineer,
nurturer, and there is a special job called the receiver which only one person can
get that job Another rule which is pretty bad, is that if a newborn isn’t healthy
enough, he or she will get released.
So there is this guy called Jonas, he has two close friends: Asher and Fiona.
Asher was funny and he was Jonas’ best friend since his childhood. And Fiona was
Jonas’ “lover”, but they didn’t know how to express that. His father was a
nurturer and his mother was a pleasant woman with a high position in the
department of justice, he also had a little sister called Lily. All of the people on the
community were colorblind, but Jonas was different, once he saw color red in his
friend’s hair. Before Jonas turned twelve he had some dreams which included
sexual content, so every person who had this dreams had to take stirrings, pills to
remove these thoughts. So the ceremony of twelve came, Asher became
assistant director of recreation, Fiona became a caretaker. And Jonas had
the special job: the receiver. The next day Jonas got a list of rules that he could
break and couldn’t, some of them included, he could lie, he should go to the
annex immediately after school, he is not allowed to tell dreams etc. Every day he
goes to annex to meet his trainer, which is called the Giver. Jonas’ job is to receive
memories and the Giver’s job is to give memories. Jonas’ first memory was one
sliding downhill, he was really surprised because he never saw or felt snow. After
this memory Jonas asked the Giver why he transmitted that memory if he loses it,
the Giver says that he has hundreds of these memories, losing one wouldn’t
bother much. The second memory is sunshine, he was surprised again. But the
third memory was sunburn. It was a little hard for him because he never felt pain
and it hurt him. Then the day is over. Their family had a new member for a short
period. His name was Gabriel, he had the same eyes as Jonas which are different
from the others. Jonas’ father took him to see if he made progress, because if he
didn’t, he would be released. Sometimes Gabriel wouldn’t sleep so Jonas
transmits some of his memories and Gabe sleeps. The next memories transmitted
to Jonas were is one of rainbow, for the first time he can see all the colors,
another memory is hunting elephants which made Jonas very sad, but the most
terrifying memory transmitted to Jonas was the one of war, Jonas was terrified
after that memory and he wanted to quit, but he didn’t. Another day he asked the
Giver what his favorite memory was, he said it was one of the Christmas morning.
Jonas gets that memory and he first feels love, he sees grandparents, which he
never knew existed. After he went home he said to his parents he said do you
love me, and they said that love is a meaningless word and it can’t be used, then
they asked him if he understood, and that was Jonas’ first lie when he said yes.
Later he found out that Gabe was going to get released because he didn’t make
progress. After all these things Jonas was very angry and he wanted to change the
rules, but the Giver said that it’s impossible, but there was a way he could share
all the memories to the people, he had to go to the outer world and pass a
location. One night he steals his father’s bicycle, he gets Gabe from the nutritional
center and he jumps of the community. After that he has a long journey he
reaches a peak in a mountain and for a moment he thinks he and Gabe are going
to freeze to death, but he hears some music from a house, and he goes there with
Gabe.