After recent completion of the Hunger Games series, I thought I'd write a super long sort of triple review of the series, starting with The Hunger Games. Enjoy.
The Hunger Games
If you read a lot or you watch plenty of movies or you've been alive since at least 2008, you've probably heard of the Hunger Games, but the short synopsis is this: Katniss Everdeen, an avid hunter from futuristic North America—known as Panem in the books—joins twelve other children between the ages of twelve and eighteen when she volunteers to take her sister's place in Panem's annual Hunger Games—a televised event in which two tributes from each of Panem's twelve districts compete against each other in a fight to the death (most likely a run on sentence). I've been looking for a book like this for a long time. A book where kids kill each other? No, silly. A book that made me crave to read more of it, a book that I couldn't put down, a book that, kind of like Harry Potter, is geared toward all ages of people, so I can share it with my mom and my grandma and my younger sister—not too young though, as there are some rather violent deaths. I really love the way Suzanne Collins writes, too, just enough backstory to be insightful but not annoying, enough action to drive the plot, and plenty of new twists to make the story intriguing without be a soap opera. Another thing I loved about this book was that Katniss, to me, was a real person. In a lot of the science fiction/dystopian stories that I've read (not that my knowledge of this genre is very deep, sorry), the protagonists are doing not feeling, or the world that has been created for them is such a stretch from our world today that the human qualities of the person don't seem very human. But Katniss was a sixteen-year-old girl, really, who was excited when her makeup looked good and who tried to sort out her feelings about the boys in her life. So great book, loved the ending, didn't necessarily see the tie-in between The Hunger Games and Catching Fire, though. I thought there was just enough closure for the book to stand alone and be great, and that's one thing that really put a damper on my Hunger Games experience. I was going to read Catching Fire regardless, but I'm not sure what twist was supposed to entice me into to it.
Happy winter! ☃☃☃☃☃ - 5/5
ALERT: If you haven't finished The Hunger Games, the first one, don't read on, don't even read the inside cover of Catching Fire because you will be spoiled and then you'll cry. Stop it. Don't even peek.
Catching Fire
In the second installment of the series, Katniss and Peeta go on their victory tour to all twelve districts of Panem and Panem's capital, which would be all fine and dandy if it weren't for rumored uprisings in the districts and threats from Panem's president Snow: feign your love for Peeta to quell the rebellions of the other districts or there'll be trouble. Every twenty five years in Panem there is an especially horrible Hunger Games known as the Quarter Quell. This year is the third Quarter Quell, how lucky. The surprise of this book happens near the middle, so there's not a whole lot I can say about the actual plot without spoiling it. All of the books are divided into three parts, and I loved the first part of this book especially. By taking Katniss back home and showing her new life there after winning the Hunger Games, I was really impressed by how fleshed out more of the characters, like Gale and his family, Peeta, and Haymitch became. I feel that by elaborating both the stories of Peeta and Gale, we kind of see her vacillate her feelings toward both of them. Something that I especially enjoyed was that Peeta was so understanding of Katniss and her situation and didn't stay mad at her forever. That could have turned quickly annoying and they both really need each other as friends. Plus Peeta is just one of those kind and forgiving people. Again, while this book is primarily a young adult book, anyone can read it and enjoy. Even though there was no real thing that drew me from one book to the next, no unexpected ending or cliffhanger in the Hunger Games, this book was still amazing, and its ending certainly made me want to read more.
WARNING: If you have not read Catching Fire or The Hunger Games, don't read on because it's pretty spoilerific. If you do, your mother is going to spank you, so don't. Just don't. Press that little back arrow or that exit button, go read the book, and don't spoil it for yourself, you goober.
Mockingjay
☃☃☃☃☃ - 5/5
Mockingjay
After the huge cliffhanger in Catching Fire and after District Twelve is demolished by the Capitol, Katniss finds out that she has unknowingly been a part of the rebels' plan before she even set foot in the arena at the Quarter Quell. Now residing in the underground city of District Thirteen, Katniss is Panem's "mockingjay," the face of the rebel force. The rebels are using her—as well as other victors from previous Hunger Games, the ones that participated in the Quell alongside her—to create propaganda which is aimed at the rest of Panem and that will hopefully instill the rebellion in the eleven other districts. This wasn't my favorite book in the series, to be blunt. Not that there was anything glaringly wrong with it, it just wasn't my favorite. There are a lot of things happening in Mockingjay. Very fast-paced, one thing after another and another, and I think that, as a last book, there should be action, but I would have liked to have dwelled a little bit more on Katniss's mum and her sister. After all, Prim is the reason she volunteered to be a tribute in the games in the first place and the one thing that drives Katniss to success, and I don't feel like we got to know Prim nearly enough. Something specific that I thought was really good was that Haymitch considers Katniss and Peeta family. That was really touching, especially since he really has no one. Although the book is more about the things that are happening as opposed to the people involved—and there are certainly a lot of new people and names, gosh, I bad at remembering names—the things that happen are still as rich and intriguing as the other two books. The ending I found rather unusual and very quick, but I honestly had no idea what to expect except that there would be a twist, and Collins did not disappoint. Overall, I'm very happy with the way the story unfolded. And it's kind of random, but I like how everyone in Panem has an unusual name. I guess their names don't sound weird to them, but I like how the names fit the dystopian aspect of the book, similar to how the names in Harry Potter are all very fantastical. Putting a rating on this book is kind of a moot point, because if you've read the other two books you can decide for yourself whether or not you're going to read Mockingjay, but . . .
☃☃☃☃ - 4/5
happy last day of 2011
happy last day of 2011
