“The Giver” by Lois Lowry

So I am still stuck in my “life-of-humans-in-the-future” phase and I am waiting for my sister to finish Warwick Davis memoirs (which she says are very entertaining, by the way) so we can start a Picture of Dorian Gray (a bit of a change of pace). Since I figured I only have a couple of days left until she is finished I decided to go ahead and read (or re-read, rather) the Giver.

This book was the first book that I read completely on my own. It was the first book that I completed and concluded was my favorite book. Since then I have read several other books that have seemed to have taken its place and the images of the book seemed to have faded with the years. I thought I would re-read it remembering the premise and not remembering much else and figured that I could get though it in a couple of days. I enjoyed it immensely.

So, The Giver. Although most of us have read this book in middle school, I will give a small summary of the premise of the book. The book takes place in a time where equality is cherished above all else. But in order to be truly equal things have been remove from society that would cause inequalities. It is considered rude to draw attention to the differences of others and people have learned to operate without many differences that people use now to define who they are and cherish the life that they have. In The Giver people are assigned, homes, family units, and occupations that they believe that they will enjoy or rather excel at due to their expressed desire and aptitude.

Jonas is a boy that lives within the society and has been assigned the task to become the town’s new Receiver. The Receiver operates with the elders and is keeper of all of the wisdom that the town knows. He is a councilor to the other elders when they face something that they have not experienced before and he uses the memories of the past to advise and guide the elders’ decisions. The Receiver is the keeper of all of the memories of the world. These are all the memories of pain and pleasure, all the tings that would make people and things different in the world; before the community went to Sameness.

This is just one of those books that I am in aw of the creativity of the book. Completely unique and once I read it, it reminded me that differences are important, and things as simple as pleasure and as harsh as pain should not be taken for granted. 

“Ender’s Game” by Orson Scott Card

So after my stint with the hunger games, I was at a loss. I was quickly measuring all other books to the Hunger Games, and realized that Harry Potter was the only other book that gave me that kind of feeling. So in an attempt to quickly get the book out of my head I went over all of the books on my bookshelf, examining all of the books that I have and had not read. My sister found Ender’s Game on my shelf and said that perhaps that would be what I was looking for. And in a way it was.

Ender’s Game takes place in future United States.  Countries have come together to form a world government and regulations have been imposed to enforce population control. Ender was born a third (the last of three children) as a special circumstance to help breed a military genius that is supposed to save the world. The story takes place as they decision is made to take Ender into military training.

In Ender’s military training there are several different classes that he has to take, but that does not matter, all that matters are the games. Ender excels quickly, is put into advanced level training far younger than anyone before him. As officials see the advancement of his training go swimmingly they begin to propel their expectations that he is suppose to be the one to protect the earth from the expected third invasion against the buggers.

I couldn’t decide whether or not I liked the book until the end. It was an easy read, and entertaining enough which kept me going, but it was at the end at I was completely sold on the book and want to read the series. There were several different plot twists and the climax was remarkable. It ended on a small philosophical note that made me want to continue with Ender’s journey’s through the next books. 

"Catching Fire" & "The Mockingjay" by Suzanne Collins

Read it.

“The Hunger Games” by Suzanne Collins

Excellent, excellent, excellent. I loved this book. It had action, it had romance, and it had a climax- resolution that was reminiscent of Harry Potter (you know the kind that starts in the middle of the book and you cannot put it down until you are though). Yep. just great.

The Hunger Games takes place after the fall of the countries in North America. All that was left was 13 districts and the Capitol of Panem. Panem is reminiscent of the idealist Russian Communist countries that were written about in the 1960s and the Districts, at some point before the book begins, rose up to fight against the Capitol. Each of the Districts were crushed except for District 13 which the Capitol could not put down, so they burned District 13 to the ground. As a reminder of the strength of the Capitol every year one boy and one girl are chosen from each of the districts to fight in an arena until the death. Their will be only one winner.

In this tale we learn about Katniss, one of the contestants of the seventy- third Hunger Games. We learn her background, her motivation, he strategy and the toll that it on her while she is in the arena trying to survive.  As she is in the arena we witness Katniss develop two very strong relationships with two of the other contenders. One is with a young girl name Rue that seems to act as a sudo- sister for Katniss. The next is the other boy from District 12, Peeta. During the development of the relationship with Peeta you cannot help fall in love with him. Peeta is one of the few characters that I have grown so attached to in a book.

Must Read.

One note about the writing: There are many, many sentence fragment. In the beginning of the book I kept having to go back and reread the sentences to make sure that I understood them right. Didn’t have to though, it seems that I understood them exactly as they were written. This is just a warning; or really more of a heads up. If you read it just be aware, but I guarantee that you will be used to it by the first quarter of the book. 

“Dracula” by Bram Stoker

I am only going to say a few things about this book.

First, I didn’t really know what the book was about, and everything I figured would happen in the book happened in the first four very action packed chapters.

Second, that is the last time you will see action. The rest are doctors and professors notes and journal entries trying to understand what has overcome the dear Miss Lucy, and then later what had to be done to prevent the spread onto other people. This comes into importance later when Mrs. Harker also begins to show the same symptoms.

Third, they really could have named the book Van Helsing and everything would have been okay. Van Helsing is the one the figures everything out, explains the phenomenon that is occurring, and devises the plan to kill Dracula. Dracula is in the book but a fragment of the time compared to Van Helsing.

And that is it. It’s a classic. If your interested in reading it do it, but I’m not going to put an all out recommendation for everyone to read, because yea; it was kind of difficult, and not much fun. 

“The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” by Stieg Larsson

My sister works at Barns and Noble and finally I asked her about the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. It was a book that everyone seemed to be talking about but no one was staying anything. When I asked my sister all she said was that everyone who reads it likes it, there is a lot of Swedish words in it, and you have to make it though the first hundred pages before you are hooked. Then I asked her what it’s about and she finally admitted that she didn’t know.

Well everything that she said was true. A lot of Swedish and the first 100 pages are crucial but once you get through it, instant favorite. Luckily I have had the privilege to spend a significant amount of time in Sweden and so I was fairly familiar with pronunciations and locations but at times it was still difficult for me.

The story is about a rogue background researchers/ security/ private investigator, named Lisbeth, who meets up with a reporter who is working on a private investigation into a missing family member of a Swedish corporate mogul. The duo ends up uncovering the truth about a series of sadistic murders that happened to young women over the last sixty years. Girl with the Dragon Tattoo takes a very deep look into the personal lives of both Lisbeth and Bloomkvest and uncovers the interesting tales behind their family life, values, finances and romances.

I absolutely loved this story and I am looking forward to reading The Girl who Played with Fire.

Must read. 

“The Minority Report” by Philip K Dick

The Minority Report I loved. So I am an inconsistent fan of Philip K Dick. I really did not enjoy the last read A Scanner Darkly but Minority Report was an amazing short story and went deep into the philosophical quandary of pre-crime and the existence of a minority report if pre-cogs did exist. It was very good, and I must admit that I was a fan of the movie. This short story went into a deeper than the movie into the concepts outlined in the movie. The short story was roughly 50 pages long action packed and wonderful. I loved this short story. Must read for every. It will at least offer food for thought for everyone reading.