The Hunger Games

Really great books. Haven't read the last on yet. The second one reminds me of the end times and the tribulation...

After reading Battle Royale (another novel with somewhat of a similar premise) I wanted to read Hunger Games, because everyone at my school said it was phenomenal and I wanted to compare the two books. However, I looked at the plot synopsis and to me it sounded.. sort of unsuitable to my tastes. The romance part really turns me off, but I want to shed my preconceptions and pick this up. It sounds like a good book.

I went in to the hunger games not really knowing what any of them were about but when I started I was hooked. I even had a few dreams that I was in the hunger games myself. At times her writing can be a bit confusing but other than that I love it! I'm currently reading the last one Mockingjay!

Team Peeta!

I really liked the hunger games too! it had the right amount of romance and poltitcs, and I liked the world that Suzanne Collins created. She made it quite believeable. it was almost as if she wanted to make a satire of politics and reality TV today. Overall it's a great series.

i have read all the books, i loved the first one, it was the best book i had read in a VERY long time, The second one was not the best, it sort of rambled on at the start, but i loved the arena idea (half way through it started to get good, i was disappointed with three, although there couldn't have been a hunger games in the book i found it disappointing. it takes me ages to read a book and i wanted to finish it before my friend because he reads fast, i found i was forcing myself to read it, i lost interest sometimes and even didn't get many things. Altogether i loved the series and can't wait for the movie. if they ruin the movie i will freak out.

-CaptainRandom

-Many crystals with many emotions

This is on my to-read list; I've heard so much about it and now (like I did with Twilight, though I hated it) I want to see what all the hype's about. It seems like everyone either loves it or hate it, but personally something about it sounds really...magnetic. Although I guess I can't have much opinion until I've actually read it.

I personally love The Hunger Games. I don't want to get into a big debate but I sure think Katniss Everdeen is a better fictional role model than Bella Swan. Just saying.

I haven't actually read them myself, but I know that several of my friends love them. I ought to get around to reading them soon they sound like my kind of thing.

I agree with everyone.

It may be a good idea, JRS -- though that's debatable -- but let's not pretend it's in any way original.

Guys, cool it. Absolutely no more flaming or I'll lock this.

Due to the cruel world, I'm removing this. I will respond to the below comment however so I don't look like an idiot myself. I don't recall saying the idea was original. I agree that it is not, it was pulled from The Colosseum, The Lord of the Flies, and many other things. Though let's not pretend that anything is original, it simply isn't. However, if we are talking originality, I do believe the way she went about the main idea was original.

-JRS

I couldn't get 30 pages into Twilight before I loathed Bella (and the plot) to the extent that I had to stop reading. Katniss had my attention from page one and held it. I agree that the writing is simplistic, but to me that's not an immediate negative. The only aspect I don't agree with is the first person, and I do think the story would have been better served in third. That being said, I care about the characters because they act like people, not cardboard cutouts of people. I like Katniss. I want her to survive and I want to know how she handles what's thrown at her. She doesn't comment on the effects her situations have had on her, the effects just occur and she deals with them, which makes sense for who she is and how she was raised.

Why do teen readers like Bella Swan? They don't. They like her boys. Take away Jacob and Edward and what is Bella? She's nothing; she exists to be adored, and the boys define her. I like Katniss because she takes action and agency, and unlike Bella, she can and does exist as a character separate from Peeta and Gale. Her attachments to them don't define her, her own actions do.While her relationship with Peeta is an important part of the story, it's a relationship based on more than his "mysterious allure" or her "entrancing qualities". It's based on personality, mutual friendship, and soldiers' camaraderie of shared trauma. This treatment of romance as something more complex than an indefinable instant desire is one of the main reasons I enjoy the story.

Plus, there is some thematic backbone to the story that I really do appreciate. It covers the effects and perception of violence, materialism and media obsession, and delves into the misconception of absolutes in war. These are all strong ideas for the intended audience to think about.

Are they the best YA novels in existence? Of course not! Better ones do exist. To me they're a step in the right direction, away from things like Twilight, Inheritance, and other "sagas" that were pushed in an attempt to compete with Rowling or fill her market void. Young writers get inspired by what they read. When I was 12 and 13, I wrote plots and characters like I saw in Heralds of Valdemar and Circle of Magic. If Hunger Games and its popularity does nothing else but get new writers back into active heroines and adventure and out of Mary Sues and boy-based melodrama, I will be thrilled. If it leads them to seek similar stories and characters and exposes them to other authors and more complex stories like I think it very well could, I will be ecstatic.

Firstly: I have read the first two books, but am unwilling to purchase the third book until it’s cheaper, at which point I’ll have read them all. I believe I made it clear in my post that I was only going to refer to the first book because the thread itself is about the first book alone. Now I will do much the same with as few references to the other books as I can manage.

Collin’s writing is poor, yes. The characterisation, dialogue and blocking are all poorly done and I will again liken her writing to airport fiction. Whether or not other writers right now are similarly deficient in this area is not the issue, I feel. When I come to those books I receive the same ill feeling of discontent – why can we not produce strong writing of a suitable level? That these poorly constructed novels are becoming a steady norm is not to justify Collin’s writing, or to explain that people feel it is amazing writing. If I am to debase the novel on this element alone, I would be entirely justified and the evidence to back me up is all there.

In regard to my expecting the story to have been finished by the end of the novel: The lack of substance led me to believe this. I didn’t expect it to be joyous and “happily ever after” or anything, I expected it to complete. Nothing really happens in this novel (Or the others, really) that couldn’t have been put into a longer but more condensed book – possibly two. Additionally, if a book ends with everything being as it was, it is still an end. Unhappy or unsatisfying endings are still endings. The saving of her sister was an obligation of sorts – she couldn’t have stood life without her little sister to make things okay. This is not to say she didn’t love her sister – as numerous references substantiate – but that saving her was something she had to do, regardless of what her feelings may have been. There are many ways of being selfish, and saving other people can certainly be so.

You mention Twilight many times without realising that the level of interest both female main characters have are the same. They’re both two dimensional and uninteresting; one finds that the other characters easily overshadow them. So what if Bella Swan is all about Edward, the book is marketed as a romance and it delivers on that, although poorly written (with the right filling and proper characterisation and such, this would not be a bad plotline, possibly). Katniss is all about survival, which makes sense considering where she is and the dangers she faces, but I should care about what happens to her. In this book I don’t care if she lives or dies, and I think that is a fatal flaw in the construction of your main heroine.

To assume that she does not learn about herself is to suggest you haven’t read between the lines. The girl is constantly learning about what she can and can’t do and what she is willing to do in the face of danger – such as killing another person. She develops an understanding of her relationships with other people (I mark the Gale-Peeta issues here). The romance between Peeta and Katniss is staged, yes, but the feelings are not. Can you truly ignore what is actually happening on the book as though you were a spectator of the show instead of reading her thoughts?

What does she do that is worse to other heroines? She is boring. Utterly so, there is no feeling in her thoughts and by the end of the book I am left wondering why I’m stuck in the mind of an unaffected individual. There is nothing wrong with a character being weak, pathetic, rude or distasteful, but if she is going to be my main character, I should at least like her as a character. I have liked plenty of terrible characters before (I would make reference here but the one which comes to mind most readily is by a YWSer who you may not have read) and I love having characters who I hate in novels, they make things interesting. Katniss is boring and I find no reason to really put her into my mind as a good, solid character.

In the end, though, it boils down to the fact that these books are poorly written. If they were stronger in this regard, most of my issues would disappear. I dislike the books, so far, and have little expectations for the final one.

PenguinAttack wrote:
While The Hunger Games is somehow compelling in that one does not want to put it down – one could almost liken it to a train wreck in this way – in most other areas it fails. Katniss is a blank and unpleasant character, particularly considering we are stuck in her self-absorbed brain. I would hazard to say that she is a typical teen in most regards, and I find the only thing believable about her is her selfishness in wanting to stay alive. She has little to no personality and I often found myself wondering why I had to be confined to her limited view of the world.
*Saves her sister – who she no doubt feels obligated to protect, but also love.
*Argues a lot about nothing really important.
*Is solitary and somewhat intimidating to everyone except her best friend and family.
*Has illegal hunting experience.
She is not pleasant or kind or nice, she isn’t particularly intelligent and she doesn’t do anything particularly stunning, other than shooting and trapping. She does stay alive, which is largely due to her not being a complete idiot and the favouritism of her sponsors. Added to which, she is clearly an attractive young woman, which Peeta alludes to several times, mentioning how other people look at her and such. It is important for our main character to be attractive, but not to be liked. Are we getting messages of judging the book by the cover? I feel it may be the wrong message here, if that is the case.

As for the other characters:
Peeta is a sweet, two dimensional character who surpasses Katniss in both interest and colour, and while he is somehow oblivious to Katniss’ stupidity when it comes to relationships, he is very likable. Gale is easily a non-entity, as is any of Katniss’ family, and Haymitch is a convincing drunk but has little else going for him. The best character so far is the stylist, whose quirks and gentle nature are realistic and engaging. Here I will also mention these strange servants – why can’t we know more about them?

In the end I feel I am left with a book which has no substance to it whatsoever. Despite political intrigue, romance, violence and action, this book falls short, and falls hard. Why did I stay up all night to read it? It certainly wasn’t the writing which kept me going – writing which many YWSers could surpass – and it wasn’t plot or characterisation. I did expect the novel to end entirely by the end of the book – why hadn’t the story finished? She hasn’t told me anything really and it doesn’t have to be as long as it is. Cut out the fake and fankly painful interior ruminations by Katniss and maybe there will be something salvageable.

I am disappointed, although not surprised, that these novels have become such a novelty among young writers. On the surface the book appears to be about a strong woman who fights to save her life while learning about herself and romantic relationships at the same time. This would easily entice readers, strong female characters are slurped up like warm soup by most readers and there appears to be easy confusion over quality.

To claim that these books are a needed addition – to suggest that there are not a bevy of strong females in YA fiction – is to ignore many fantastic writers and their books. To mention some writers: John Marsden, Enid Blyton, Tamora Pierce, Alison Croggin. These books are not to be over looked! Particularly not for substandard fiction which does little for female characters on the whole, once you study the text closely.

I disagree almost entirely with everything that has been said in this thread. The Hunger Games presents a sad indication of how easily readers acclimatise to airport fiction in their everyday lives. By airport fiction I mean books which are created – and read like they have been created – for consumption on a flight, ready to be discarded once they are no longer needed. An example of which is Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code and, as I am presenting now, The Hunger Games.

While The Hunger Games is somehow compelling in that one does not want to put it down – one could almost liken it to a train wreck in this way – in most other areas it fails. Katniss is a blank and unpleasant character, particularly considering we are stuck in her self-absorbed brain. I would hazard to say that she is a typical teen in most regards, and I find the only thing believable about her is her selfishness in wanting to stay alive. She has little to no personality and I often found myself wondering why I had to be confined to her limited view of the world.
*Saves her sister – who she no doubt feels obligated to protect, but also love.
*Argues a lot about nothing really important.
*Is solitary and somewhat intimidating to everyone except her best friend and family.
*Has illegal hunting experience.
She is not pleasant or kind or nice, she isn’t particularly intelligent and she doesn’t do anything particularly stunning, other than shooting and trapping. She does stay alive, which is largely due to her not being a complete idiot and the favouritism of her sponsors. Added to which, she is clearly an attractive young woman, which Peeta alludes to several times, mentioning how other people look at her and such. It is important for our main character to be attractive, but not to be liked. Are we getting messages of judging the book by the cover? I feel it may be the wrong message here, if that is the case.

As for the other characters:
Peeta is a sweet, two dimensional character who surpasses Katniss in both interest and colour, and while he is somehow oblivious to Katniss’ stupidity when it comes to relationships, he is very likable. Gale is easily a non-entity, as is any of Katniss’ family, and Haymitch is a convincing drunk but has little else going for him. The best character so far is the stylist, whose quirks and gentle nature are realistic and engaging. Here I will also mention these strange servants – why can’t we know more about them?

In the end I feel I am left with a book which has no substance to it whatsoever. Despite political intrigue, romance, violence and action, this book falls short, and falls hard. Why did I stay up all night to read it? It certainly wasn’t the writing which kept me going – writing which many YWSers could surpass – and it wasn’t plot or characterisation. I did expect the novel to end entirely by the end of the book – why hadn’t the story finished? She hasn’t told me anything really and it doesn’t have to be as long as it is. Cut out the fake and fankly painful interior ruminations by Katniss and maybe there will be something salvageable.

I am disappointed, although not surprised, that these novels have become such a novelty among young writers. On the surface the book appears to be about a strong woman who fights to save her life while learning about herself and romantic relationships at the same time. This would easily entice readers, strong female characters are slurped up like warm soup by most readers and there appears to be easy confusion over quality. To claim that these books are a needed addition – to suggest that there are not a bevy of strong females in YA fiction – is to ignore many fantastic writers and their books. To mention some writers: John Marsden, Enid Blyton, Tamora Pierce, Alison Croggin. These books are not to be over looked! Particularly not for substandard fiction which does little for female characters on the whole, once you study the text closely.

I read the book, and I thought about it, and frankly, it isn’t worth the hype it’s getting – much like Twilight. I make the disclaimer here that I am only referring to the first book of the Hunger Games series and no others.

*Hearts* Le Penguin

Oh. My. Gods. You mean a story has a premise that sounds a little bit similar to another story?! Come off it. It's like saying "I don't want to read Alastair Reynolds because I've seen Star Wars". They both happen in space and have spaceships so they must be the same!

Yes, the premise is similar, but it ends there. It's not the same characters, it's not the same plot, so how could it be the same story?

Psh. I already saw Battle Royale.

Prokaryote, it's like apples and okra.

Twilight: Chronically depressed teen girl obsesses over equally obsessive, controlling vampiric boy and/or racially profiled werewolf boy. More depression and whining ensues.

Hunger Games: Teen girl sacrifices self for sister in televised gladiatorial slaughter against 23 other teens for the amusement of the wealthy elite. Genuine PTSD and political upheaval ensue.

Massively different.

I despise Twilight with every fiber of my being, and I love Hunger Games. It doesn't try to be edgy, it has real guts. It's a story about the effects of violence on young adults and a commentary on fluff and falsified media wrapped up in a solid package of story and great characterization that teen readers still find accessible. It's not gory, but the moments of violence are presented in the quick, understated fashion that reminds me of The Things They Carried, and even has all of the uncomfortable psychological aftermath. If teen girls obsess over this story, then that's a good, good thing. It's a far superior story for them to obsess over. I hope boys get in on it, too, because the world needs more boys like Peeta and Gale and more girls like Katniss, Rue, and Prim. Like I said though, if they don't see past the "Which boy?" factor (which is an extremely minor part of the story) they haven't really understood what they've just read and need to read it again in a year.

This series sounds like it's trying too hard to be edgy. Every teenage girl loves it, and that sends a warning signal to my brain. I think: What was the last series teenage girls loved?

Oh. Yeah. That series.

I remain skeptical.

This series is a long-needed injection of true girl power and intelligence into young adult fiction, and I freaking love it! Where other YA heroines are cardboard cut-outs designed for the reader to paste themselves onto, Katniss is her own character. She's a complete person with her own strengths and flaws, but you still relate to her struggle. THAT is what makes a good character! Her "which boy do I choose?" dilemma does not consume her thoughts because there are more important things in her life! Unlike Bella Swan who spends pages telling us how compassionate and nice she is and then does nothing but whine about her life, Katniss genuinely cares about people, even people she barely knows and she does something about it. Plus she's an archer, and so am I and that's AWESOME!

The whole premise of the story is fascinating, but if doesn't make you a little disgusted while reading it, you don't understand it yet. It doesn't shy away from the magnitude of the violence, and if you ignore the social commentary in favor of "Team Peeta! Team Gale!" fluff, read it again and really pay attention. I mean...that scene towards the end of Mockingjay

I love the Hunger Games too! Did you guys know that there is a page about the Hunger Games? It's really cool, and there is even a discussion going on where it's like a virtual HG and you are one of the tributes! It's lots of fun, and you can still join! It just counts as a late reaping! You can PM me or Sionarama for more information. Come join!

Don't know if I'm Team Peeta or Gale. Right now it's Gale, but it tends to change a lot.

~~Ktg

I LOVED The Hunger Games! It was so addicting, I could literally not put it down!

OMG! The Hunger Games are sooo awesome! That is one of my favorite series! I started reading it and couldn't stop. I can't decide whose side I'm on, Peeta's or Gale's...I mean, Katniss doesn't really like Peeta, but Gale...I don't know. Probably Gale's, he needs more support anyway. I didn't like the end of Catching Fire very much. I hope Mockingjay is a good addition to the series. I can't wait to read it!
Team Gale!

I absolutely LOVE the Hunger Games.

I'm so teem Peeta, he's so sweet, and- anyway, I probably don't need to describe him to you! You've already formed your opinion!
Katniss is a big meanie, she's awesome, but also very clueless - and mean. xD

Auditions? If anyone finds anything about auditions you have to let me know! ... please?

~Mo.

*squeal*

I love the Hunger Games! It's so action-packed and tense and generally amazing!
There were no bits that I thought, 'well, this is getting dull', which normally happens in books - the author will go mad descibing something I couldn't care less about.
I also thought they weren't too predictable =]

Erm... Team Katniss and Cinna?
Cinna rocks!
...I don't really like Peeta - he seems to spend the majority of the first book being saved by Katniss. Maybe I just dislike him 'cause my friend never shuts up about him being such a hero...

I think it would be awesome to be Cato. Bad guys are funner to play.

I loved the Hunger Games. Every chapter ends in total suspense, making the book very addictive. It kept me on the edge of my seat with every passing moment. And it's wonderfully written with easy language that conveys a lot of meaning.
Ok done with the review...
On the Peeta and Gale subject, I'm team Peeta. Gale is great but the story has been centered around Katniss's relationship with Peeta, and I would be very disappointed to see her end up with Gale, unless the last book shows that Gale is more worth it.
Until now though... TEAM PEETA!

I absolutely love the Hunger Games! Although I do have to say that it was a mite predictable at times.
I was looking up auditions, as well, but I couldn't find much. I really want to be Thresh, but, if they play the Avox capture scene in flashbacks, I'd want to be the boy that gets killed.

Yes, I definitely will!

I can't pick. Haha.
Elinor! Let me know if you find anything!
I'll do the same.

I don't have a favorite book, but if I did, the Hunger Games would definently be in the top 5! But on the subject of Peeta or Gale... I can't decide. They're both awesome! And I'm so excited about the movie because Suzanne Collins is making the screenplay! Hopefully, that will mean the movie won't crash and burn like other books-made-into-movies I've watched.

The Hunger Games is definitely an amazing book. It was charming, original, fresh, and excellently written. The only thing I could really nitpick about it was its predictability.

Captain- I am also searching for auditions. I am gunning for either Clove, or the girl from District 1.

Team Peeta

Love it! I'm actually looking up Auditions for the movie as I speak. I want to play Katniss so badly!