The Hunger Games

The Hunger Games

by Suzanne Collins

★★★★☆

 

I read The Hunger Games before I started blogging, which means, before I heard the hype. I’m sure that had an effect of my opinion of it. One friend recommended it to me, but there was no ground swell of obsession at that point, so I was surprised by just about everything in the book and I loved it. I recently reread it, to refresh my memory before the movie’s release, and I was happy to find I enjoyed it just as much the second time around.

 

Here’s the basic premise, Katniss Everdeen lives in a dystopian society called Panem. It’s split into 12 districts, each one of which has its own unique aspects (fishing community, coal mining, etc.). Each year a lottery is held and one boy and one girl between the ages of 12 and 18 are chosen to compete in the annual Hunger Games. The 24 “tributes” must then fight to the death on live television, while the rest of the world watches. When her young sister Prim is chosen as a tribute, Katniss volunteers to take her place.

The plot includes elements of everything from Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” to gladiator fighting, but it still manages to feel completely unique. The characters are unforgettable. I usually have trouble remember who is who when I pick up a second book in a series months after reading the first. That wasn’t the case here. Each person stood out distinctly in my mind; Haymitch, the drunken former tribute, Cinna, the quiet designer, etc.

I particularly loved Katniss as a character. She’s one of the main reasons I enjoyed the book so much. There are so many characters that give us great examples of the emotional struggles that go hand-in-hand with extreme trials, but she is not one of these. She is hard and distant. She has been made this way because of the role she was thrust into. When her father died, her mother shut down and Katniss either had to find a way to provide for her mother and sister or she had to watch them die. Her strength and logically way of thinking is something much more relatable to me. She is not soft and emotional and there’s no reason she would be in this society. It feels so much more realistic.

It was always a bit frustrating to me that people made a big deal of the so-called love triangle in the series. To me, that was always a tiny subplot, not a focal point. Gale and Peeta are both interesting characters, but the story is one of survival, not which one to she has a crush on at the moment.

For me, Hunger Games isn’t about love triangles or even dystopian societies. Those are all aspects of the story, but the heart of it is the struggle of one young woman. Obviously her struggle to survive in District 12 and in the games, but it’s also about her struggle to become an adult at a young age, to deal with an unreasonable amount of responsibility, to reconcile her instinct for survival with her emotions, and her desire to make a better life for herself and her family. The book conveys this wonderfully and makes it impossible for me to put it down.
 

p.s. I saw the movie this weekend and I loved it. Of course there are going to be things to criticize and I didn't love all of the casting, but overall I thought they did a wonderful job. I also liked seeing some of the things that were going on outside of the arena, with Seneca and in District 11 and 12. I thought that added a great element to the story. So if you are interested in it, definitely go see it!

Image from here