Published May 28, 2010 by Perfection Learning.
COULD YOU SURVIVE ON YOUR OWN, IN THE WILD, WITH EVERYONE OUT TO MAKE SURE YOU DON'T LIVE TO SEE THE MORNING?
In the ruins of a place once known as North America lies the nation of Panem, a shining Capitol surrounded by twelve outlying districts. The Capitol is harsh and cruel and keeps the districts in line by forcing them all to send one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen to participate in the annual Hunger Games, a fight to the death on live TV.
Sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen, who lives alone with her mother and younger sister, regards it as a death sentence when she steps forward to take her sister's place in the Games. But Katniss has been close to dead before--and survival, for her, is second nature. Without really meaning to, she becomes a contender. But if she is to win, she …
COULD YOU SURVIVE ON YOUR OWN, IN THE WILD, WITH EVERYONE OUT TO MAKE SURE YOU DON'T LIVE TO SEE THE MORNING?
In the ruins of a place once known as North America lies the nation of Panem, a shining Capitol surrounded by twelve outlying districts. The Capitol is harsh and cruel and keeps the districts in line by forcing them all to send one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen to participate in the annual Hunger Games, a fight to the death on live TV.
Sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen, who lives alone with her mother and younger sister, regards it as a death sentence when she steps forward to take her sister's place in the Games. But Katniss has been close to dead before--and survival, for her, is second nature. Without really meaning to, she becomes a contender. But if she is to win, she will have to start making choices that weight survival against humanity and life against love.
So I read this after a friend made me watch the movie. The story's a pretty interesting one. I mean aftermath of a revolution as the Capital makes poor people fight to the death for their amusement. Plus the social commentary on reality TV? It was actually a really interesting book.
I wasn't expecting much when I ordered this book from the Amazon Lending Library, but I found the story to be more engaging than I'd expected. The book is clearly written for young adults, but it was pretty easy to look past that. While the prose could be awkward and the story superficial, I still found the main characters sympathetic and engaging. If you're looking for a quick, entertaining read from the lending l library, I'd recommend this book.
The "Running Man"-meets-"Hannah Montana" mashup was not doing it for me, but I am clearly not the target audience
One of the very few books where I'd say that the movie is better.
The Hunger Games had me completely riveted from the first line to the last.
It's a really novel idea, a fine depiction of what can happen if reality shows ever go too far.
Despite me knowing that it's this fact which I should have been focusing on, I truly got involved in the Games. I found myself rooting for our heroine, Katniss Everdeene, wishing her competitors dead, wishing she would kill them, and truly hoping that she would win.
As to Katniss herself, she's a bit of an enigma. She sometimes comes across as the tempestuous, temperamental teenage girl that she is, and often does completely unpredictable, irrational, and illogical things. Other times she's cool, calm and collected; a true survivor.
She's a truly interesting character, and I'd love to play someone like her in a tabletop role playing game. She seems as though she was made for it!
I really enjoyed reading this book! Highly recommended.
I saw the movie first. I was surprised that the movie was really close to the book. On the other hand: the book is so short there wasn't much room to leave out anything. That's my only critique really: way too short. I finished the book in one sitting. I enjoyed that sitting: the characters are believable, no weird motivational jumps, no unexplained skills or out of character actions. The emotions of the characters are credible. I was put off at first by the first person narrative but it turned out fine. If I had not seen the movie it would probably have been full of suspense. Even so I could not put the book away. Only four stars because all in all it is a bit too simple for my taste: the writing style, the plot, the characters - it all screams "young adult" and the books I read …
I saw the movie first. I was surprised that the movie was really close to the book. On the other hand: the book is so short there wasn't much room to leave out anything. That's my only critique really: way too short. I finished the book in one sitting. I enjoyed that sitting: the characters are believable, no weird motivational jumps, no unexplained skills or out of character actions. The emotions of the characters are credible. I was put off at first by the first person narrative but it turned out fine. If I had not seen the movie it would probably have been full of suspense. Even so I could not put the book away. Only four stars because all in all it is a bit too simple for my taste: the writing style, the plot, the characters - it all screams "young adult" and the books I read right before were the ASoIaF series ... a stark contrast.
So: if you enjoyed the movie it is worth a read and if you haven't seen the movie it is still worth a read.
A good story which is significantly hampered by leaden prose. I understand that this is young adult fiction, but the plodding along of 'I say' 'he says' with only functional paragraphs becomes tedious. As far as themes go, this is very interesting and I like the social satire.
An entertaining,fast paced book about a distopian society that resource to intimidation as one of the means of control.
It will not change the world of literature and I dont' think that's the authors intent.
This book must be really appealing to teenagers.
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Un libro entretenido, de ritmo veloz, sobre una sociedad distópica en la que la intimidación es usada como un medio más de control.
No creo que que cambie el mundo de la literatura, pero no creo que haya sido la intención de la autora.
Este libro debe resultar muy atractivo a los lectores adolescentes.
Literatura para chavales, entretenida pero no se le puede pedir demasiado. Personajes sencillos, narraci��n r��pida sin ninguna complejidad, apta para el veranito.
I had heard a lot about The Hunger Games. There are books, there is a film. After a while I became intrigued and purchased the e-book. At first it was difficult to get ‘into’ the story, as I could not entirely place it in its temporal context, but as soon as that was over (took me a while, I admit), the book became good, and more interesting as I progressed.
I find the background of the Hunger Games shocking. Think of a society that looks nice, advanced, refined, and then there are the Hunger Games. The background of the games is laid out very well in the story, and it’s done in a way that is not boring. The story moves along at a good pace and has a nice balance between introspection of the main character, Katniss, and what happens around her. The story also shows what can go …
I had heard a lot about The Hunger Games. There are books, there is a film. After a while I became intrigued and purchased the e-book. At first it was difficult to get ‘into’ the story, as I could not entirely place it in its temporal context, but as soon as that was over (took me a while, I admit), the book became good, and more interesting as I progressed.
I find the background of the Hunger Games shocking. Think of a society that looks nice, advanced, refined, and then there are the Hunger Games. The background of the games is laid out very well in the story, and it’s done in a way that is not boring. The story moves along at a good pace and has a nice balance between introspection of the main character, Katniss, and what happens around her. The story also shows what can go around inside the heads of people when they are thrown into an arena where literally they battle for life and death.
I thoroughly enjoyed reading The Hunger Games. I am not certain if I shall continue with the other two books in the series. Perhaps in time.
Picked this up after seeing the movie. It's a fairly quick read but enjoyable, and explained a few details that were skimmed over in the movie. I do enjoy a strong, (mostly) sensible heroine.
When my wife first read this a while back, I read the first paragraph over her shoulder and couldn't resist making fun of it. The phrase "the reaping," smacked of cheap sci-fi melodrama. Later, after The Hunger Games blew up and everyone was hysterical over the movie, I tried reading the book again, but again couldn't get past a few pages. The sentences were too short, lifeless, devoid of meaning.
When I discussed this with my wife, she advocated for the "truncated" sentences as having more power due to the circumstances of the character in the story. This idea of the power of truncated sentences made me think immediately of Hemingway. And that's when I found out that she had never read Hemingway!
So I made her a deal. I would read this pop culture phenomenon of a book if she would read A Farewell to Arms.
I finished reading …
When my wife first read this a while back, I read the first paragraph over her shoulder and couldn't resist making fun of it. The phrase "the reaping," smacked of cheap sci-fi melodrama. Later, after The Hunger Games blew up and everyone was hysterical over the movie, I tried reading the book again, but again couldn't get past a few pages. The sentences were too short, lifeless, devoid of meaning.
When I discussed this with my wife, she advocated for the "truncated" sentences as having more power due to the circumstances of the character in the story. This idea of the power of truncated sentences made me think immediately of Hemingway. And that's when I found out that she had never read Hemingway!
So I made her a deal. I would read this pop culture phenomenon of a book if she would read A Farewell to Arms.
I finished reading the first book of The Hunger Games this morning, and I admit to enjoying it much more than I thought I would, given my initial reaction. Sticking militantly to her short sentences, the author creates a fantasy world of warfare, romance, and survival that reads like an updated, media-driven cross between The Most Dangerous Game and The Lord of the Flies. The fact that Collins' sentences are short and slick ends up contributing to the overall theme of all actions and words being tuned to the everpresent eye of the camera and an audience hungry for cheap action and thrills. The story is thus imbued with some sense of self-awareness and deeper critique of human society, though I do wonder whether the book thus ends up falling under it's own subversive critique.
In other words, it may be just a little too action driven and slick for its own good. I understand that it is a book marketed, ostensibly, for teen girls, and I also get that the entire realm of deeper thought and critique of society is left up to the reader to develop. And I do appreciate that the main character is a girl who is strong and who resonates with values of the working class and the poor. But I wonder about the shallow world, lacking any sense of real history, that Collins has created, and about the true powerlessness that her characters have if that world is taken as one of reality. There is no hope in such a world, no matter the outcome. Such worlds can indeed be effective settings for deeper explorations of humanity, such as Cormac McCarthy weaves in The Road and Blood Meridian.
I question whether the depth of feeling we are ultimately made to feel for Katniss, Peeta, and Rue is fully earned, and furthermore, the critique that then comes as a result of that questioning must be confined to pointless comparisons of our own society. I say pointless, because beyond some obvious parallels to the patrician society of Rome, there's nothing enough to add up as a substantial critique, beyond our own infatuation with sensationalist media and our own ease in being led towards projecting emotion for characters that stand unmoored from any history or depth of context and relationships.
It either speaks to the power of the author that this is indeed her very point, or it speaks to our credulousness as consumers. I guess I'll just have to let you be the ultimate judge on that point.
At the end of the day, the most we can say, perhaps, is that we enjoyed the experience.
Entertaining? Yes. Was I expecting more? Yes.
So I'm a bit late to this series, but I wanted to read it before seeing the movie. If you are looking for a good "vacation" read, this will definitely satisfy.
However, I had one fundamental issue/nitpick/complaint about this book: It reads like one long run-on sentence. Seriously! There is absolutely no pacing and no sense of time. Apparently the actual "Game" itself lasted weeks! But there is zero sense of that time passing when you read it. I imagine Katniss as the narrator telling this story in complete monotone and never once stopping for breath.
Glad I finally got around to read it, but sincerely wished it was better.
I wasn't crazy about the writing, but the explanations of the history were complete and concise, the plot and pacing were excellent. I enjoyed it.
