Living in a "perfect" world without social ills, a boy approaches the time when he will receive a life assignment from the Elders, but his selection leads him to a mysterious man known as the Giver, who reveals the dark secrets behind the utopian facade.

"Your cell phone provider tracks your location and knows who's with you. Your online and in-store purchasing patterns are recorded, and reveal if you're unemployed, sick, or pregnant. Your e-mails and texts expose your intimate and casual friends. Google knows what you're thinking because it saves your private searches. Facebook can determine your sexual orientation without you ever mentioning it. The powers that surveil us do more than simply store...

In Saintstone everyone gets tattoos recording their deeds from birth until death, and the ink lets every other citizen know your triumphs as well as your sins; so when Leora's father dies and she sees glimpses a symbol of a horrible crime on the back of his neck she is horrified, and sure it is a mistake--and in her efforts to find out the truth she discovers the lengths that Saintstone will go to preserve its "perfect" society.