Edwardsville Public Library discussion

This discussion will be moderated by Alana T.

Hello All! I hope some of our viewers will take a moment and share thoughts about this book. I reread it and loved it just as much the second time around as the first. I'd like to know what you think...

One aspect of the book I appreciated was how key elements of the story are slowly revealed, so that the reader develops a more nuanced image of what is happening to Jonas as the plot progresses. It's quite sophisticated. For example, in the beginning of the book, the joke about the pilot being "released" is told in passing. It isn't until 3/4 of the way into the book that you realize the full extent of what the phrase means.

What aspect of the book (if any) was most chilling for you? Any thoughts?

I think the concept of "release," and how nonchalantly it is discussed and handled was the most disturbing thing to me. Not only is it discussed and joked about so thoughtlessly, but the task of "releasing" is performed so commonly that even children (like Fiona) don't think twice about it. It made me think about how nonchalantly we can often discuss death in our society as well. Through the media we're exposed to death from a very young age, and I wonder how earlier generations might perceive our society in that respect.

Along these lines, the author describes how all the serious issues we deal with as humans are treated so casually by society in the book. Love, emotion in general, death, memories and their consequences, all of these are just set aside. It makes me wonder what these people thought was so horrible about emotion that they would willingly (seemingly) give up all the good things to get rid of the bad.