The Messenger

I suppose I may as well continue this book series, yes? After The Giver and Gathering Blue is The Messenger.

This third book sort of ties the first two together. Matty, the main character, was a dirty street kid from Kira's community in Gathering Blue, and he now lives in the community where Jonas now resides.

This book also delves more deeply into the concept the the main characters' gifts. In The Giver, Jonas was shown to have the ability to See Beyond, but the only aspect of that that we saw was his ability to see colors even though the community kept everyone drugged to only see in black and white. In Gathering Blue, Kira's stitching is shown to have a magical, almost prophetic, quality; but the only bits of that seen were in her scrap of cloth that warned or comforted her at times.

In The Messenger, Jonas is able to stand at a window, look out at a forest, and watch the progress of Matty and Kira as they make the journey from Kira's community, a hike lasting several days even for a person without a crippled leg like Kira. As for Kira's gift, she displayed it to Matty when he came to collect her. She could sew with her eyes closed; and once she finished sewing, the picture she created changed, displaying a scene in which she enters the forest with Matty.

Whew, that's a lot of background and not very much story. But this book does clear up and add to a lot of the stuff we have seen in the previous books. Maybe tomorrow, I'll tell you more about Matty's story.