Messenger

After reading Messenger, I now understand how Lowry's Giver Trilogy connects!  Character from The Giver and Gathering Blue come together in yet another community developed extremely well by Lowry.  As is in all of her 3 books of this series, it leaves more questions unanswered and open ended than answered.   It makes readers think!  The book shows that communities, technology, people, and society in general do not stay stagnant.  Society morphs and changes with each person who comes into contact with it.  It also demonstrates the need for communication and compromise.  When people work together instead of altruistically, they have more peace in a community.  When there are secrets there is no trust, unrest will take over and the community will fail.   In the end the theme of power comes into play when Kira, Matty, and Leader use their powers together to save Village.

Summary from www.commonsensemedia.org

 In Village, outcasts from other places, often wounded or handicapped in mind, body, or spirit, have always been welcome. It's a simple place, but friendly and kind. It welcomed little Matty when he appeared one day out of Forest, though his abusive past had made him a thief and liar, and soon enough softened him with kindness. Taken in by Seer, an old blind man who can see what others cannot, he has grown into youth and hopes to become Messenger when he is given his adult name.But things are changing: people are becoming less kind, and talking about closing Village to outsiders, Forest hides a malevolence that is making it lethally dangerous, and Matty is beginning to discover within himself a gift for healing that frightens him. When Seer sends him to fetch Kira from her village on the other side of Forest before Village is closed, Matty does not know if he can bring both of them safely back.