Hunger Games
So the past two weeks have been consumed with the Hunger Games. I’d never read the books and I wound up seeing the movie twice opening weekend. I loved it and got curious enough to read the books. Read the 1st one last week and over the weekend I wound up in 3 days finishing “Catching Fire” and “Mockingjay”, which I finished last night.
Firstly it’s been years since a book has grabbed me like the Hunger Games did. So much so that Mark actually seemed jealous that I spent most of the past three days readying those books. Anyway, my point for writing this entry is that the ending has me really really bummed. Let me state though that I think the series was perfect. It was a story to teach kids about war and to get them thinking about the world around them. I think if it had ended happily the message wouldn’t have stuck. But I think that’s part of what has me bummed, thinking about the awful stuff that happened in the book, but thinking you know…that behavior isn’t far fetched. This stuff does happen in the world and definitely happens during war. It made me sad for seeing how completely f’ed up some of the characters become after things they’ve seen and had done to them. I’ve heard some people say they didn’t like Mockingjay because they didn’t like that so many people died, and that some of the deaths, like Finnick’s, had no point. But that is the point, isn’t it? Life doesn’t always make sense, and the good people don’t always make it. Another criticism I’ve read is that Gale and Katniss never said goodbye to each other. But I think they summed it up when Prim got killed by most likely his bomb, and how Katniss wouldn’t be able to separate him from that memory, and how when he was gone she just felt relief.
The biggest part that bugs me is about Peeta. I grew attached to Peeta in the books, and the stuff he went through was extremely painful to read. How in the end him and Katniss are finally together, which I was hoping for all along, but it’s as two broken survivors.
Anyway, these are my thoughts on the book. I just wanted to write them out because damn, I don’t remember a book bumming me out so much, even after it was over! So I say, good job Suzanne Collins.