Currently reading
A Clash of Kings
The Diviners
The Book of (Even More) Awesome
Dear Bully: Seventy Authors Tell Their Stories
Shatter Me
Cress
Truth & Dare: 20 Tales of Heartbreak and Happiness
Watchmen
The Giver
Starting graduate school has been a big step towards achieving my goal of becoming a children’s librarian, so I’ve been trying to catch up on my children’s classics. Thankfully at the beginning of 2011 I’d decided that I had to read The Giver by Lois Lowry this year. I picked up my copy during Banned Books Week and immediately lost track of my socks because The Giver knocked them right off. The horror, world, and characters of The Giver blew me away to the point where I was in tears while riding my over-crowded bus to work.The world in The Giver is all about control. Your family, your career, your entire life are picked out for you. When I started the book I was look, “Hmm. This is decidedly creepy.” Once I got to Jonas’s interactions with The Giver, I couldn’t stop reading. Part of what makes The Giver so exceptional is that the plot and the world-building, not just one or the other, will give you goosebumps and blow your mind.The Giver was a really difficult book for me to read. Lowry deals with the themes of choice, life, and death head on. The twists and turns that she inserted to do so shocked me, brought tears to my eyes, and kept me glued to the page.Considering how much I love dystopian novels, I can’t believe I waited so long to read The Giver. Lowry’s novel surpassed all of my expectations. I’m glad I picked it up at last and am eager to push it on young readers.