Gathering Blue - the Giver - Comparison

The book, The Giver comes before Gathering Blue and is about a boy who lives in a world where everything is exactly the same - everyone sees in black and white, the things they do are boring, there is no pain and no sadness (and therefore no true happiness either). The book is filled with confusion suspense and amazing struggles within himself and with his community. At the end of the book the boy escapes with an infant that the people in his community were trying to kill.

Gathering Blue is a companion novel that takes place in a community in the same time period as the boy in the Giver, but the community is much more like ours (color, happiness, sadness, etc.). The book is about a girl. At the end of the book it can be interpreted that the boy from the Giver is now in charge of her community.

Usually I would give and opinion of "I think this book is better" but in this case it is fact. The Giver is much better than Gathering Blue. The giver gave you more to think about in relation to what the character was going through, there was more suspense and definitely more action. Gathering blue seemed to spread the story out in an almost suspenseful like setting where you kept waiting for something to grab your emotions or attention the way the giver did. Gathering blue is not a terrible book but I was highly disappointed when reading it up against the expectations I had for it in comparison to "The Giver" However there is third book that I have not read yet that apparently is brilliant by most reviews You have to have read Gathering Blue to understand The Messenger so in that gathering blue might actually serve a purpose other than being a mediocre book.

Nevertheless, I found some comparisons between the books for you to read over.

In the two books, there have been some similarities and some differences. Right away, we discover that the main character in each of the books is a younger child. 12 or 13. We find this out in Gathering Blue because Kira's name is 2 syllables (which I indicates the age) and we find this out in The Giver since Jonas has to go to the ceremony of 12. There is a December ceremony in the Giver that they host every year. It is important because it is like a birthday for everyone and it is the day that everyone matures. In Gathering Blue, they also have an important ceremony but this one is in the fall and this one is called "The Gathering". A few obvious differences in the two books are that in The Giver, no one has any feelings or can see any color but in Gathering Blue, everyone feels their own feelings and sees color. In fact, a very important part of the book has to do with color. That is the thread that Kira is dyeing so she can work on the singer's robe. One very important similarity in the two books is that both the main characters in each of them [Jonas and Kira] seemed to have a special gift or power.