The Worlds of Lois Lowry 3 Copy Boxed Set (The Giver, Gathering Blue, The Messenger) [Paperback]

Lois Lowry (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 22, 2006

When Jonas turns 12, he is singled out for special training from The Giver. Now, it's time for Jonas to receive the truth. There is no turning back.
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Kira, an orphan with a twisted leg, lives in a world where the weak are cast aside. When she is given a task that no other community member can carry out, Kira soon realizes she is surrounded by many mysteries and secrets--and an extraordinary power of her own.
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Matty has always been proud to be Village's Messenger. But now that Village is closing its once-welcoming doors, Matty must make one last journey through the treacherous forest, and must make a great sacrifice to save the place he loves.
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The Worlds of Lois Lowry are brought to life through three extraordinary characters, and the unexpected connections among their lives.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Lois Lowry is an award-winning author who has written many popular books for young adults. She was twice the recipient of the Newbery Medal, for Number the Stars and for The Giver. The author lives in Cambridge, MA.

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 12 and up
  
• Paperback
• Publisher: Ember (August 22, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385733895
• ISBN-13: 978-0385733892
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 2 x 8.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (38 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #13,901 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #93 in Books > Teens > Literature & Fiction

More About the Author

Lois Lowry is known for her versatility and invention as a writer. She was born in Hawaii and grew up in New York, Pennsylvania, and Japan. After several years at Brown University, she turned to her family and to writing. She is the author of more than thirty books for young adults, including the popular Anastasia Krupnik series. She has received countless honors, among them the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, the Dorothy Canfield Fisher Award, the California Young Reader.s Medal, and the Mark Twain Award. She received Newbery Medals for two of her novels, NUMBER THE STARS and THE GIVER. Her first novel, A SUMMER TO DIE, was awarded the International Reading Association.s Children.s Book Award. Ms. Lowry now divides her time between Cambridge and an 1840s farmhouse in Maine. To learn more about Lois Lowry, see her website at www.loislowry.com

author interview
A CONVERSATION WITH LOIS LOWRY ABOUT THE GIVER

Q. When did you know you wanted to become a writer?

A. I cannot remember ever not wanting to be a writer.

Q. What inspired you to write The Giver?

A. Kids always ask what inspired me to write a particular book or how did I get an idea for a particular book, and often it's very easy to answer that because books like the Anastasia books come from a specific thing; some little event triggers an idea. But a book like The Giver is a much more complicated book, and therefore it comes from much more complicated places--and many of them are probably things that I don't even recognize myself anymore, if I ever did. So it's not an easy question to answer.

I will say that the whole concept of memory is one that interests me a great deal. I'm not sure why that is, but I've always been fascinated by the thought of what memory is and what it does and how it works and what we learn from it. And so I think probably that interest of my own and that particular subject was the origin, one of many, of The Giver.

Q. How did you decide what Jonas should take on his journey?

A. Why does Jonas take what he does on his journey? He doesn't have much time when he sets out. He originally plans to make the trip farther along in time, and he plans to prepare for it better. But then, because of circumstances, he has to set out in a very hasty fashion. So what he chooses is out of necessity. He takes food because he needs to survive. He takes the bicycle because he needs to hurry and the bike is faster than legs. And he takes the baby because he is going out to create a future. And babies always represent the future in the same way children represent the future to adults. And so Jonas takes the baby so the baby's life will be saved, but he takes the baby also in order to begin again with a new life.

Q. When you wrote the ending, were you afraid some readers would want more details or did you want to leave the ending open to individual interpretation?

A. Many kids want a more specific ending to The Giver. Some write, or ask me when they see me, to spell it out exactly. And I don't do that. And the reason is because The Giver is many things to many different people. People bring to it their own complicated beliefs and hopes and dreams and fears and all of that. So I don't want to put my own feelings into it, my own beliefs, and ruin that for people who create their own endings in their minds.

Q. Is it an optimistic ending? Does Jonas survive?

A. I will say that I find it an optimistic ending. How could it not be an optimistic ending, a happy ending, when that house is there with its lights on and music is playing? So I'm always kind of surprised and disappointed when some people tell me that they think the boy and the baby just die. I don't think they die. What form their new life takes is something I like people to figure out for themselves. And each person will give it a different ending. I think they're out there somewhere and I think that their life has changed and their life is happy, and I would like to think that's true for the people they left behind as well.

Q. In what way is your book Gathering Blue a companion to The Giver?

A. Gathering Blue postulates a world of the future, as The Giver does. I simply created a different kind of world, one that had regressed instead of leaping forward technologically as the world of The Giver has. It was fascinating to explore the savagery of such a world. I began to feel that maybe it coexisted with Jonas's world . . . and that therefore Jonas could be a part of it in a tangential way. So there is a reference to a boy with light eyes at the end of Gathering Blue. He can be Jonas or not, as you wish.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Trilogy, July 3, 2007

By 

M. Espinoza "I shanked with my shiv!" (Orgrimmar, Durotar) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Worlds of Lois Lowry 3 Copy Boxed Set (The Giver, Gathering Blue, The Messenger) (Paperback)

This box-set is one of the most enduring trilogies I have ever read. The first book is an instant classic, The Giver. I actually read this book back in 1994, when I was in the 4th grade. I read it now again, and I am still just as enamored with it. I didn't even know there were two other books that followed until I did some research. The next two books are just as good, and the best part is that are not carbon-copies. One could actually read them by themselves, but it's so much better when you know the stories before them.

19 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars "The Giver" is amazing, November 10, 2008

By 

Angel Delgado - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Worlds of Lois Lowry 3 Copy Boxed Set (The Giver, Gathering Blue, The Messenger) (Paperback)

The only book in this set that I loved was "The Giver". The other two were ok if you really want to know what happens to Jonas, or if you want to know more about the world that Lois Lowry created. But honestly I'd rather have just read the first book and left the rest to my imagination. Gathering Blue was ok, a little drawn out and not very exciting. The messenger was more interesting then Gathering Blue. I feel that the fault of the two lies with my own expectations and the lack of wonder and the mystic of "The Giver". After reading "The Giver" I was left with so many questions and a sense of awe. After reading the entire trilogy I was left underwhelmed and disappointed. In my opinion "The Giver" is a must read, the other two could be skipped.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great boxed-set, February 22, 2010

By 

S. Rutter "Florida Teacher 27" (Florida) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Worlds of Lois Lowry 3 Copy Boxed Set (The Giver, Gathering Blue, The Messenger) (Paperback)

I didn't know before this year that _The Giver_ had two other books that were companion texts. I was excited to find them all three collected together in one attractive boxed-set. My students have been fighting all year to see who could borrow _Gathering Blue_ and _The Messenger_ next.