Status
Available
Collection
Series
Genres
Publication
Clarion Books (2018), Edition: Reprint, 192 pages
Description
In this novel that unites characters from "The Giver" and "Gathering Blue," Matty, a young member of a utopian community that values honesty, conceals an emerging healing power that he cannot explain or understand.
Awards
Young Hoosier Book Award (Nominee — Middle Grade — 2008)
Charlie May Simon Children's Book Award (Nominee — 2007)
CCBC Choices (2005)
Language
Original language
English
Original publication date
2004
Physical description
192 p.; 8.25 inches
Media reviews
While ''Messenger'' may tie the three stories together just a little too neatly, it is still far from a sweet resolution. Up to the last anguished page, Lois Lowry shows how hard it is to build community. I suspect that many young readers will want to return to all three stories.
Ben
This book is about a boy named Matty who came to the Village six years ago and now they want to close the village to newcomers. Matty must send messages to those who are planning to come and move to the Village including where he originated from. I didn't really like this book as it didn't interest
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me and its description's were weak and vague. I didn't like the way the author wrote the book especially at the end of the book where it was unclear what happened. I think it is a good book for people who like science fiction books. I also didn't like this book because it had mythical things like "using your gift to change the world." Show Less
User reviews
LibraryThing member fingerpost
I thought this was better than "Gathering Blue," but not on par with "The Giver."
The third in the series is set in yet another community in this post-apocalyptic world. Matty, the little boy who left the village towards the end of "Gathering Blue" is the protagonist, now living in a different
The book is an allegory for the obsessive greed and consumerism of our modern world, especially in the United States. But while we understand the metaphorical purpose for the mysterious trader and for the forest suddenly becoming a hostile and willful force, from the practical literal story, these things are not explained in the least. I an appreciate the symbolism, but when the writer presents something that demands an explanation in the story, I expect to get an explanation by the end, and these two key plot elements are not explained.
So, not terrible... but not recommended either.
The third in the series is set in yet another community in this post-apocalyptic world. Matty, the little boy who left the village towards the end of "Gathering Blue" is the protagonist, now living in a different
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village (called Village.) In Village, people get along, are good to each other, and welcome outsiders who manage to find their way through the forest (called Forest). But a mysterious man has begun to come to Village on occasion and hold a "Trade Mart" in which he asks people what they want, and what they have to trade. It is quickly evident that he is trading parts of their personality or souls. The town is becoming more selfish with each Trade Mart. Soon the borders will be closed, and Matty is sent on a mission to his previous home to bring back Kira, his friend from home, and the actual daughter of his adoptive father in Village. But Forest itself is also becoming hostile, and his once simple trek through the paths of the woods becomes fraught with danger.The book is an allegory for the obsessive greed and consumerism of our modern world, especially in the United States. But while we understand the metaphorical purpose for the mysterious trader and for the forest suddenly becoming a hostile and willful force, from the practical literal story, these things are not explained in the least. I an appreciate the symbolism, but when the writer presents something that demands an explanation in the story, I expect to get an explanation by the end, and these two key plot elements are not explained.
So, not terrible... but not recommended either.
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LibraryThing member tjsjohanna
I was grateful to see this book tie the other two books in the series together. I still find myself wishing I understand how everything works in this world. And how it all got to be this way. I didn't like the ending - it wasn't very fair!!
LibraryThing member bkhall
The beginning of The Messenger starts out with the people of Village living in a utopian society where everyone welcomes outsiders and provides for one another, governing as a democratic unit. True to Lois Lowry’s style, the perfect community doesn’t last long and Village encounters problems
The Messenger is a companion novel to The Giver and Gathering Blue. I actually listened to it on audio book and it was a little under four hours – great for a short road trip this summer. This is an easy book to read that will leave you thinking long after you finish reading. I think teens that enjoyed Scott Westerfeld’s Uglies series would probably like this book as well.
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that stem from the local Trade Mart, where one can trade off more than just materialist possessions. Matty, the main character, watches as his community declines; their values move from being selfless to being selfish. One of the main issues in this book is whether or not to continue to welcome outsiders or close off Village; readers will see how this mimics some of the debates happening over immigration in the United States.The Messenger is a companion novel to The Giver and Gathering Blue. I actually listened to it on audio book and it was a little under four hours – great for a short road trip this summer. This is an easy book to read that will leave you thinking long after you finish reading. I think teens that enjoyed Scott Westerfeld’s Uglies series would probably like this book as well.
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LibraryThing member AngelaB86
I think Messenger had a promising beginning, and interesting plot, but the ending was kind of...blah...for me. I don't know how to elaborate on that without giving it away, so I'll just leave it at that.
LibraryThing member kapilalove
13 (or thereabouts) year old Mattie lives with Seer, and we come upon his story as he discovers both a secret power he has, as well as his own disturbing realization that the Village he has called home for 6 years, once a welcoming place for all sorts of people -- including petty thieves as he was
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when he came there -- is now building a wall to seal itself off from others who would like to come and live there. The people are changing, too - they're bartering their own selves for goods like "gaming machines," and fur coats. Seer sends Mattie to bring back Seer's daughter, Kira (whom we meet in the book Gathering Blue), and together, they must make the journey back through the forest before it swallows them up. Will they be able to make it back in time too, before the wall is built? This is a companion novel to Gathering Blue; it is helpful to read the Lowry novels in sequence, beginning with The Giver. Show Less
LibraryThing member 1morechapter
It's very hard to describe Messenger without giving away parts of The Giver and Gathering Blue. This is the third book in that trilogy. So I'm not going to say anything about the book, other than I enjoyed it very much but consider it to be the weakest of the three. It was nice to have a sequel
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that wrapped up (somewhat) the other two titles. Show Less
LibraryThing member GennaP5
This was a good book to read. It always kept me interested. I would first read The Giver before this book. It is about a boy named Matty who lives in a community. Matty has this speacial gift. The gift is to cure people and animals. When Matty has to go on an important mission he learns how
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speacial his gift really is. Show Less
LibraryThing member taylorh
Conclusion to The Giver Series
Jul 07
This book answered questions for me about the series, many of which I didn't even realize I had until I was presented with the end result. Part of what I had enjoyed about the previous two was the open ending. It is a complete story on its own, but I really
Jul 07
This book answered questions for me about the series, many of which I didn't even realize I had until I was presented with the end result. Part of what I had enjoyed about the previous two was the open ending. It is a complete story on its own, but I really
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really recommend reading The Giver then Gathering Blue first. Memorable and thought provoking. Show Less
LibraryThing member kmcgiverin05
This book is great for upper intermediate ages and is full of twists. Lowry really takes you into her created world, and it is hard to put the book down.
LibraryThing member TakeItOrLeaveIt
didn't leave a lasting impression but I guess i'm glad Jonas (from The Giver) made it somewhere worthwhile.
LibraryThing member mochap
heartbreaking 3rd book in the series. very moving
LibraryThing member Aerrin99
This book falls somewhere between The Giver and Gathering Blue - the story and characters are far stronger than what Lowry offers up in Gathering Blue, which makes her metaphors and meaning feel less cumbersome and preachy than what we saw in the other book. It's also free of the wince-inducing
It's not as eloquent or creative as The Giver, but it's still a strong work that uses familiar characters and an unfamiliar world to make interesting points about greed and selfishness and community.
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dialect that pervaded the second in the series.It's not as eloquent or creative as The Giver, but it's still a strong work that uses familiar characters and an unfamiliar world to make interesting points about greed and selfishness and community.
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LibraryThing member Alejandrogu
The story is a bout a kind of utopian village. The main character is Matty which is the messenger, he is the only one who the forest likes. Matty haves a great power that will come in handy later on.I really like this book, it answer the question that the giver left my that was "what happened to
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Jonas?". It resulted that Jonas became the leader of the village and has mastered the power in seeing beyond. Show Less
LibraryThing member ABookVacation
Pretty good story. It was CLEAN... you don't see that a lot in YA literature. I'm putting this on the outside reading list for my 9th and 10th graders. I think they will enjoy it. It's a quick enough read, and it's fast paced (though the ending sucks), so it will keep their interest.
LibraryThing member NoahK
Last in the giver triliogy, Matty must bring Kira to hi village
LibraryThing member porch_reader
From almost the first sentence of the book, Lowry creates a world that is not like our own. Through the eyes of Matty, a boy who is entering adolescence, we learn about Village, its residents, and the changes that may soon change it forever.
Although [The Giver] is still my favorite Lowry book,
Although [The Giver] is still my favorite Lowry book,
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[Messenger] was also an excellent read. Not only has Lowry created an interesting world, but she reveals it slowly. At first, Village is deceptively similar to our world. But gradually, the differences come to light. Lowry is also incredibly good at writing adolescent characters. Matty is faced with both with the normal challenges of adolescence as well as major changes in Village. As he faces both sets of challenges, he's stretched in ways that help him to grow. Perhaps because both sets of changes are presented together, they feel believable in a way that would not be possible without the inclusion of the typical adolescent changes (falling in love, negotiating an independent identity). Show Less
LibraryThing member melydia
Matty is the messenger for Village, the one who can brave Forest to deliver messages between various settlements. The story begins at a pivotal moment in his life: he's discovered a wonderful and terrifying ability, he will soon receive his True Name, and Village, founded as a sanctuary for
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refugees, is considering closing its doors. It is the third of a loose trilogy that began with The Giver (a truly excellent novel) - that is, it takes place in the same universe and has some overlapping characters. I never read the second book, Gathering Blue, but I didn't feel like I needed to. Truth be told, I wasn't that impressed with this story. It was too predictable, even for a young adult book. Maybe I'd have liked it better had I read Gathering Blue (or at least more recently read The Giver) but I doubt it. Usually I like dystopian tragedies but this felt forced. All in all, not one of Lowry's better books. Show Less
LibraryThing member kerath25
I felt this book to be a wonderful work that speaks of how even communities conceived in the best of ideals can falter. It has a wonderful lesson that we can apply to our own situations today, but does not thrust it upon the reader. I love how Lowry takes concepts that are normally very difficult
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to describe, let alone defend, and works them into a world that we can understand their importance. Show Less
LibraryThing member edspicer
This book is just such a page turner. You just can't help but be pulled in emotionally to Matty's life and problems. You almost with this was a movie at times so you could really get a feel of what's happening. This story is very emotional and fun to read.
4Q, 4P; Cover art: Awesome!
The book is best
It was selected since reading (and owning) the companion "Gather Blue."
Grade: 11th
(AB-AHS-NC)
4Q, 4P; Cover art: Awesome!
The book is best
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suited for Middle School on up.It was selected since reading (and owning) the companion "Gather Blue."
Grade: 11th
(AB-AHS-NC)
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LibraryThing member princessofthesea
Subject Area: Language Arts
Genre: Fantasy
Critique/Summary:
Because this book has a time and place that are made up by the author (Village, forest, etc.) it falls in the Fantasy genre. The storyline is completely impossible in reality. For example, it would be impossible for a forest to start
(Stars for Setting)
Age: Middle School - High School
Genre: Fantasy
Critique/Summary:
Because this book has a time and place that are made up by the author (Village, forest, etc.) it falls in the Fantasy genre. The storyline is completely impossible in reality. For example, it would be impossible for a forest to start
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attacking travelers.However, the author makes the impossible seem believable in the way that she writes. It is also interesting to consider the metaphor that the author may be presenting. (Stars for Setting)
Age: Middle School - High School
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LibraryThing member wagner.sarah35
A good conclusion to the tale that began with The Giver and Gathering Blue. Having read the first two some time ago, I was glad to see a few memorable characters return and finish their stories. I liked the character of Matty and the message of the story, but I was a little disappointed by the
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book's conclusion. Show Less
LibraryThing member PhoebeReading
This is clearly the weakest link in Lowry's loose trilogy of speculative YA novels. There's an air of unaccountable mysticism about--we receive no explanation for the Gifts of the main characters, the nature of the sinister Trade Market, or what, precisely, is going on in the Forest that leads our
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hero to eventually martyr himself. It's that ultimate sacrifice that leaves me mostly unsatisfied with the novel; if the Forest is an illusion, it's unnecessary for Matty to sacrifice himself, and the Deus Ex Machina results of his actions imply that he could have just done it much earlier, saving himself. Was Lowry trying to give us a Lewisian Jesus allegory? Who knows--but it's not really enough to satiate the reader. Show Less
LibraryThing member AnFa0822
A fantastic read. It was a bit slow, and had only a bit of action, but, at the same time, it had action in emotions and the ways people live. I did enjoy this amazing book, that tied together death, love, change, and a new world all together.
LibraryThing member Hdeel
for the past six years Matty has lived in village and flourished under the guidance for seer who's a blind man known for his special sight and seemed to know everything that you think he is see things but he is not actually. Village was once a place that welcomed newcomers but something sinister
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has seeped into Village and the people have voted to close it to outsiders. Matty has been invaluable as a messenger. now he must make one last journey through the treacherous forest with his only weapon, a power he unexpectedly discovers within himself. Show Less
LibraryThing member Bibliotropic
While, as the others, this book tackled some interesting themes that deserve their time in the spotlight, I confess myself a little bit disappointed by just how much was left unsaid in Messenger. In The Giver and Gathering Blue there were undoubtedly some mysterious pieces that were left
But in Messenger, it seemed like some potentially huge things were there only to drive the plot to a certain point, and that point had nothing to do with the issue. I'm talking about Trade Mart, mostly. People make trades for things there. A new thing for an old thing. Something they don't want for something they do want. But at some point, it goes beyond material objects and people start trading away pieces of themselves in order to improve their physical appearance, for example. How? It's most certainly a deal-with-the-devil thing, but while the negative changes occur in people because they traded away their souls for material possessions or a better physique to impress the opposite sex, I couldn't help but wonder how it was all happening, or how it started to happen. Was it the man running Trade Mart exercising a power of his own? Was it entirely metaphorical? So much more could have been done with this, but instead of was just used as a way to get people to isolate and close off Village so that Matty could have a reason to go into Forest.
And then there are the parts that get amplified, once again seemingly so that the plot could advance toward a specific point.
We do, happily, get to find out that Jonas survived and that the ending of The Giver was not his dying hallucination, which now nicely ties all three of the books together. But his ability to "see beyond" has changed. It was kind of assumed in The Giver that it meant his growing ability to see colour, to perceive how things should have been. It tied in well with the Giver's ability to "hear beyond", which was him hearing music. But in Messenger, Jonas's ability has turned into the power to see across long distances. It serves its purpose, but that's my whole point. It serves its purpose, and much like the purpose of Trade Mart seemed to be to place Matty outside Village, the change in Jonas's ability seemed to be to put him in the right place to convince Matty to sacrifice himself to heal the world.
Moving, certainly, and Matty's sacrifice was definitely a touching scene that did bring tears to my eyes, but it seemed to be so pre-determined that it was hard to look back on anything before the ending and feel the same anxiety about what was going to happen.
I praise this book for the same reasons that I praised the others, for the author having the guts to assume that kids can handle more than bland notions about how the world really works beyond Saturday morning TV shows. But so much more could have been done with this that it's hard to close it without feeling a bit let down, like I've only read part of the story. It's a shame that what started out with a bang ended with a fizzle. Still a touching fizzle, but it didn't have the same drive behind it that the previous books did.
I do recommend reading this one, and I did enjoy it and won't say otherwise. Especially if you enjoyed the other two books in the series, you don't want to miss finding out all the little ways that they ultimately tie together. But if you liked the other two for the same reasons that I did, you may find yourself as disappointed as I am by this last novel in the trilogy.
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unexplained, but at least they were unexplained for a good reason. In The Giver, no explanation is given as to how a Receiver or Giver and transfer memories, but then it's made pretty obvious that the characters don't entirely know either. It just is. In Gathering Blue, Kira and Thomas don't quite understand how it is that they things they make can give them messages of things happening elsewhere, but they neither take it for granted nor try to come up with some explanation. It is what it is.But in Messenger, it seemed like some potentially huge things were there only to drive the plot to a certain point, and that point had nothing to do with the issue. I'm talking about Trade Mart, mostly. People make trades for things there. A new thing for an old thing. Something they don't want for something they do want. But at some point, it goes beyond material objects and people start trading away pieces of themselves in order to improve their physical appearance, for example. How? It's most certainly a deal-with-the-devil thing, but while the negative changes occur in people because they traded away their souls for material possessions or a better physique to impress the opposite sex, I couldn't help but wonder how it was all happening, or how it started to happen. Was it the man running Trade Mart exercising a power of his own? Was it entirely metaphorical? So much more could have been done with this, but instead of was just used as a way to get people to isolate and close off Village so that Matty could have a reason to go into Forest.
And then there are the parts that get amplified, once again seemingly so that the plot could advance toward a specific point.
We do, happily, get to find out that Jonas survived and that the ending of The Giver was not his dying hallucination, which now nicely ties all three of the books together. But his ability to "see beyond" has changed. It was kind of assumed in The Giver that it meant his growing ability to see colour, to perceive how things should have been. It tied in well with the Giver's ability to "hear beyond", which was him hearing music. But in Messenger, Jonas's ability has turned into the power to see across long distances. It serves its purpose, but that's my whole point. It serves its purpose, and much like the purpose of Trade Mart seemed to be to place Matty outside Village, the change in Jonas's ability seemed to be to put him in the right place to convince Matty to sacrifice himself to heal the world.
Moving, certainly, and Matty's sacrifice was definitely a touching scene that did bring tears to my eyes, but it seemed to be so pre-determined that it was hard to look back on anything before the ending and feel the same anxiety about what was going to happen.
I praise this book for the same reasons that I praised the others, for the author having the guts to assume that kids can handle more than bland notions about how the world really works beyond Saturday morning TV shows. But so much more could have been done with this that it's hard to close it without feeling a bit let down, like I've only read part of the story. It's a shame that what started out with a bang ended with a fizzle. Still a touching fizzle, but it didn't have the same drive behind it that the previous books did.
I do recommend reading this one, and I did enjoy it and won't say otherwise. Especially if you enjoyed the other two books in the series, you don't want to miss finding out all the little ways that they ultimately tie together. But if you liked the other two for the same reasons that I did, you may find yourself as disappointed as I am by this last novel in the trilogy.
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