The Giver by Lois Lowry (American, 1993)

Summary:
Jonas, like any other Eleven soon to become a Twelve, has been waiting for this very special December. The Ceremony of Twelves is the last and most important of the ceremonies in the community. For the past eleven years the Committee of Elders have been observing Jonas in order to assign him the job that he will carry out for the rest of his adult life -that is, if he wishes to remain a member of this community. Much to his surprise, upon the Ceremony of Twelves Jonas finds out that he has been assigned with the most important job: he has been selected as the next Receiver in Training, a unique role in the community. As Receiver of Memory in training, Jonas's duty is to contain all the memories from previous generations back and back, all of which are handed down by the former Receiver: The Giver. But Receiving memories proves to be a challenge as Jonas experiences firsthand emotions that have been deleted from every other community member. The memories reshape Jonas and soon enough he no longer agress with the community's strict enforced repression of emotions and choice. Both Receivers understand that there is only one way to change the community for good and that is to give them back the memories. By abandoning the community and travelling to Elsewhere, beyond the communities, beyond the life he has always known, Jonas hopes his memories will go back to the people who may, at last, be able to feel again.

Another summary:
Jonas is eager to turn twelve years old. It is at this age that adult life basically begins. His age will not matter from then on, but he will have to begin his training​. It is the committee of Elders, the leaders of the community, who each year inform all Twelves of their Assignments. As individuals are thoroughly observed since birth, each child is assigned a job based on his interests and aptitudes. At the Ceremony, Jonas is chosen to be the new Receiver, the most important Assignment as there are very few who have the ability to "see beyond." As far as Jonas knows, the Receiver is the Elder who resolves what to do when the Comittee cannot reach an agreement.
 
 Soon after meeting the old man functioning as the current Receiver, Jonas learns that it is expected of him to act as a living vessel for humanity's memories. The Receiver shows Jonas that before the Sameness, people had free will to choose their occupations, partners, etcetera, which in turn lead to suffering. In an effort to avoid repeating the same mistakes that differences entail, the Sameness was introduced: babies are genetically modified so that they cannot perceive color, the community's landscape is artificially created so everything looks the same, medicine removes discomfort immediately, adults are medicated to suppress sexual impulses, spouses are to be matched by the Committee, which also decides when a marriage is to become a 'family unit'; rather than children being blood related to their parents, they are collected from assigned birth mothers and given to a suitable family unit. Along with the new government, the population is under surveillance at all times with the purpose of making sure that social norms are being followed.
 
 The task of the Receiver is to maintain both the memories and the wisdom that they entail without risking the community to suffer them or their collateral damage. Every day, the Receiver gives memories to Jonas, who experiences all these new events as if they were his own. After about a year of training, Jonas and the Receiver decide it is best for the community to regain their memories. In order to do so, they plan for Jonas to receive as many memories as possible before he actually turns thirteen, when he will have to run away from the community. When a new Receiver fails to complete his training, the memories he had carried up until that point are released for the rest of the community to experience. In spite of Jonas pleading him to flee together, the old Receiver plans to stay behind to help the community cope with and accept their newfound knowledge.
 
 However, Jonas is forced to leave nights in advance to what was originally planned. After a newborn is labelled as unfit to live within the community, Jonas's father reveals he will have to 'release' the baby the following morning. Thanks to his training, Jonas had already learnt that releasing someone meant to execute them, not, as it is popular belief, to relocate them in another community. Horrified by his father's comfort with his job, Jonas takes the newborn and leaves the community. After much travelling, Jonas and baby Gabriel are exhausted, yet Jonas remains certain they will find a better place.

Another summary:
The novel portraits the polarization of an ideology with the result of an arguably perfect utopia, but one that makes use of technology as a mean of opression and control in a world where not even the heads of the community are aware of what's going on, although this does not stop them from allowing the practice of Euthanasia, or control over the language, interests, access to culture, and sexual freedom of people. The Giver is set in a non-specified future, in a place referred to as "Community." In there, many of the problems of the past have been eradicated and people live in peace and without pain. The inhabitants of this community know nothing about concepts such as pain, war, hunger or famine, instead, they enjoy the benefits of a society living under the concept of "sameness," which means that emotions, both positive and negative, are not part of the world anymore. They coexist under a vague sense of happiness. In many aspects, the world can be argued to be better than the one the author lives in. 
 
 The citizens of the community are to develop abilities and grow under the care of a non-blood-related family until they reach the age of twelve; when this happens, they are taken to a ceremony in which the Chief Elder in front of parents and children communicates the duties the "twelves" will be required to perform, for example: nurturer, caretaker of the elder, games designer and entertainment, scientist, among others. However, one of the most important roles is being the Receiver of Memory, an individual who is given all the memories from the past and whic task is to advise the heads of the government what to do in case there is a situation that has never happened in the past, for this person is not longer part of the "sameness."
 
 The novel presents the Community, the families and the lifestyle as desirable for the characters mainly because they are not aware, nor they are capable to be aware, of how their reality is compared to the past. In one hand it could be seen as a case of successful socialism, however, as the story moves along, the negative aspects arise: the lack of freedom of thought, the impossibility of expressing emotions or sexual pleasure. Nonetheless, the one and only one person who can understand these concepts is the Receiver, again, because he or she can understand the present compared to the past. Jonas, the main character, lives in the community inside a family of four: Mother, Father, his sister Lily, and him. When he turns twelve, he is chosen as the next Receiver of memory. The Giver has talks with him about the past and they conclude they want to change the things so people can understand concepts as love, pain, actual happiness, and others. Eventually, Jonas flees from the community along with Gabriel, a child that was to be Released because he did not meet the requirerments of the newborn. At the end, the reader is not really capable to be aware of Jonas doing anything to change this lifestyle.

World view: Describes in a variety of aspects and with some consistency an imaginary state or society which is regarded as better, in some respects at least, than the one in which its author lives.
Future projections: It’s a negative emotional reaction against technological (transcendental, evolutive) or social progress. As such, It shows the horrible consequences of utopia or at least portrays skepticism or disappointment in regard to scientific or technological miracles.
Ideology:  It’s either the polarization of an ideology or an absurdist exaggeration of unfortunate or odd circumstances
Characters, plot and writing style: A perfectly planned social order derives on the personal satisfaction and psychic well-being of the characters.
Classification: Non-dystopia