So, that trilogy I mentioned over the last two posts was actually the Hunger Games Trilogy by Suzanne Collins– The Hunger Games, Catching Fire and Mockingjay. My interest in the books was piqued late last year when the trailer for the forthcoming movie adaptation was released.
The trilogy features a dystopian future in which the world experienced some disaster and populations were significantly reduced. North America was restructured into the nation of Panem, consisting of thirteen districts and the Capitol. Each district fulfills some role necessary to the survival of the rest of Panem– agriculture in one, textiles in another, and so-on– while the Capitol are the elite who rule the country. When District Thirteen sparks a rebellion against the Capitol, it is razed to the ground by it and wiped from the face of Panem. As punishment to the remaining districts (cowed by the obliteration of Thirteen), each year they are required to select one boy and one girl between the ages of 12 and 18 to send to the Capitol as “tributes”. These 24 tributes are then sent into a massive, wilderness arena to survive and fight each other to the death. Only one tribute will survive. The entire thing is broadcast across Panem as some sort of sick reality show Olympics meets American Idol, as a reminder that the Capitol’s power is absolute and dissent will not be tolerated. These are the Hunger Games. (The winner’s district will receive more beneficial treatment.)
The protagonist of the series is a sixteen year old girl named Katniss Everdeen, who volunteers to serve as District Twelve’s tribute when her younger sister Prim’s name is randomly drawn. The first book opens with an introduction to Katniss’ life in District Twelve, proceeds to her volunteering to serve as tribute, and then you’re off into a whirlwind of Capitol-based reality TV banality that leaves Katniss (and the reader) shocked at the detached way Capitol citizens look forward to these Games where children kill each other. Then you hit the Game itself.
The trilogy does not shy away from showing how psychologically scarring such experiences are (exemplified by the stream of past winners who must serve as mentors to the current batch of tributes– which means watching them die year in and year out). There’s sadly no way to describe what happens in the second and third books without completely spoiling the first, so I’ll limit it to the broad way Collins herself described the series trajectory in an interview. In the first book, you have the Hunger Games. In the second book, you have revolution. In the third book, you have war. But there is an incredibly smart and logical flow to everything in the books and just because Katniss is very central to the movement of these plot developments does not mean she’s in control nor that she’s leading the charge the way a Harry Potter might. It was a refreshing way to approach a story like this and, as a result, consistently defies expectation.
If I were to offer any criticism, it would be this: there is a point in the third book where it (understandably) takes on a surreal atmosphere. I read it convinced it was a dream sequence and it was only that it kept going on that it proved to be reality. A tighter narrative in that section would have helped. But, in the face of three books worth of material, that is a surprisingly small complaint.
I devoured all three Hunger Games books in a matter of days. There are elements of the story that have stayed with me ever since. I quite simply cannot recommend these books enough. There is a reason these are the top 3 books on Amazon right now and it is wholly deserved. Even if you think they look to be one kind of story, trust me when I say you’re probably wrong. Go the library route if you must (although I point out the Kindle edition is under $5 on Amazon), but at least read it. You won’t be sorry.