The Giver (illustrated; gift edition)
I loved this book when I first read it, looking back now I see a lot of parallels between this and Murakami's "Hard Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World" which was published first, in Japan.
I wonder if Lois Lowry knew Japanese?
I guess there are a lot of books like this one out there, this is just the children's version.
Don't get me wrong this book is a gift to the world and it did have a lot of differences from Murakami's, but I can't help but wonder...
 - Lois Lowry, Bagram Ibatoulline)