Read: April 9, 2012
I spent most of the month of March reading The Hunger Games Trilogy. Also in March, the first movie was released which is partly why I started reading the books.
Summary: The setting is a new country, Panem, which replaces the ruins of North America. At it’s centre, the Capitol reigns the surrounding twelve districts that make up Panem. As punishment for a long ago war that the districts waged against the Capitol, the Capitol enforces an annual televised event, “The Hunger Games”, where one girl and one boy from each district are chosen to fight to the death on live TV. Katniss Everdeen, the main character of the trilogy, lives with her mother and sister, volunteers to represent her district in the games. The trilogy follows Katniss from the 75th hunger games in the first book, the 76th hunger games in second book, and the rebellion in the final book.
The Hunger Games Trilogy Boxed Set
My Thoughts: I was barely able to put the first two books, The Hunger Games and Catching Fire, down for a second after the first few pages got me completely hooked. The relevancy of the storyline rooted in today’s reality television popularity and combined with the very dramatic life-or-death plot was very compelling. The first two books definitely were very entertaining, and incredibly disturbing all at once. Although the storyline is brutal and the writing is geared for young adults, the main characters are teenagers, there’s very little physical romance and I would consider the violence as PG-13. The last book, Mockingjay, was a disappointment for me. The drama that pulled me through the first books quite quickly was lacking in the last book. It was a bit boring and the ending was not what I expected.
Movie: The Hunger Games movie, the first released in the series, was just ok. I don’t think it lived up to the hype it was getting. The details I read the book didn’t translate well into the movie and half the book wasn’t left out. Movies like the Harry Potter and Twighlight series did the books justice since whatever I imagine from the books were well captured on film. The Hunger Games movie only capture some of what I imagined but for a three hour movie and the hype it was getting the filmmakers could have a done a lot more.
