The Giver (Quarter Omnibus)
The thing is, I read The Giver back in middle school, it lowkey traumatized me and kept haunting me for a while, then I learned there are 3 other books of the same universe, and it took me another 5 years to actually read them.
I loved analyzing the first book, so I was very actively reading the three others, taking notes of themes, references, keeping a mental map of the reoccurring characters. I'm a bit disappointed that, for such an elaborate worldbuilding, some questions were never answered.
What happened with Jamison in Gathering Blue? How did Kira manage to change her society? Gabe's defect came from him being a twin in the first book, but in Son it's because he was born through a C-section... Why the hell did Matty have to die?????????? (I'm very angry about this one...)
It took me an embarrassing amount of time to notice the biblical undertones too, it hit me like a brick in the face in the fourth and last book, when Jonas tasked Gabriel with defeating the incarnation of evil (who also lowkey came out of nowhere... It would have been nice to connect Trademaster to the others communities too, like, idk, JAMISON) to save his virgin-like mother. I don't mind those when they're really exploited, but there, they felt somewhat lacking and barely scratching the surface of what could have been.
Anyway, it was a nice, easy read, a bit of a let-down. I think the first book is a nice standalone, and despite my excitement when Jonas' and Kira's plots converged, the books gradually lost what made The Giver so interesting to me, and slowly but surely drifted into some kind of lowcost fantasy.
