Lois Lowry has done a great job marketing her latest book, Son. For a few weeks now, I haven’t been able to open a newspaper, turn on NPR or read through favorite blogs without hearing something about the final book in The Giver quartet. A few weeks, ago, I got an e-mail from my mom with a link to her Goodreads newsletter and read about Son again.

I decided that this book was a must read.

At the same time, though, I decided I should start at the very beginning. Somehow, I had never read The Giver or its companions, Gathering Blue or the Messenger. For the past few weeks, I have lived in magical worlds. From a community lacking all emotion, to a place where artists are valued but manipulated, to a terrifying land where evil reigns and finally to new worlds and old where love overcomes all.

While each of these books are said to stand alone, I am so happy to have had a chance to read them all at once. To have watched as one world weaves in to another, as one character meets another and then another, their worlds coming together. What a gift these books are to readers. If you, like me, can climb into these worlds and settle in for a while, please do. The experience will remind you of why you are a reader.