Mockingjay
by Suzanne Collins
Scholastic Press, August 2010
400 Pages

I have finally finished reading Mockingjay. For those of you who have been living under a rock, Mockingjay is the third and final volume in Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games Trilogy. Set in a dystopian future where once a year children are forced in to an arena and kill each other until there is only one left standing. Things get complicated in Hunger Games when Katniss Everdeen manages to piss off the over controlling government at the end of the first book. As a result, she is thrown back in to the next year’s Hunger Games but instead of winning, she inadvertently gets sucked in to fighting for the rebels to bring down evil President Snow. And thus, there is were Mockingjay picks up.

In my review of Catching Fire, I compared the book to The Matrix Reloaded in terms of story progression. I’m thankful that I am not able to compare Mockingjay to The Martix Revolutions. Having been essentially been kidnapped by the rebels, Katniss is forced to play the role of the Mockingjay which is largely symbolic. Since she has become something of television sensation, the rebels plan to use her to rally they districts against the capital. It takes some convincing but she makes a deal with them on the condition that she gets to kill President Snow when the time comes.

Story-wise, there is no official Hunger Games in this book. I was kind of wishing that Collins found some way to slip it in much like she did in Catching Fire. But instead this book is all about the battles going on between the two sides. Near the end, when Katniss is in the capital and is hunting down President Snow, the idea of Pods is introduced and brings about the same type of atmosphere that made reading about the Hunger Games in the first book so compelling. However, this time around the traps get sprung in such a rappid succession that I felt practically overwhelmed. At one moment Katniss is being shot at, then attacked by some deadly black goo, and throw some lizard-human hybrid super mutants in to the mix to round it out.

This leads to my biggest complaint about the book (aside from Katniss choosing the wrong guy), the pacing is off. The first half of the book is rather a slow read and Katniss doesn’t do much. A lot happens, but it’s not because Katniss does anything. Imagine reading The Hunger Games but instead of seeing things through the eyes of Katniss, the events are shown as if we were watching them on television. Katniss plays a passive role until she is finally let loose inside the capital.

If you’ve made it this far in the series, then what you are wanting is some closure. Going in to this the question I was wondering was who Katniss was going to end up with, Gale or Peeta? This love triangle that Collins had been dragging out since the first book was just about as annoying as the Jack-Kate-Sawyer love triangle from LOST. And in the end, I think Katniss choose poorly. But that’s just my opinion.

Also, what’s with epilouges nowadays? Has it become nessesary to show characters like Harry Potter and Katniss Everdeen twenty years in the future and with kids of their own? What literary value does this add to the story? Katniss never showed interest in getting married or having kids so showing that she has done both ruins the character that has taken three books to establish.

Catching Fire (Hardcover)
by Suzanne Collins
Scholastic Press, September 2009
391 Pages

Spoilers ahead, just FYI

I wasn’t quite sure where the story would go after Hunger Games. As we last left our hero, Katniss and Peeta had just won the Hunger Games. Now that 6 months has past, it is time for the traditional victory tour of the 12 Districts. Their first stop is District 11, home district of Rue who died in the most recent Hunger Games. In the previous book, the reader is only told little bits and pieces of the other districts but Katniss never travels to them. I was interested to see how all the different districts would react to being forced to throw a celebration for two kids who had hunted other kids from the district. However, District 11 is the only one that gets time devoted to it. All the others are quickly glossed over and forgotten. Oh, and then Peeta pops the question in an attempt to stop the uprisings that have started as a result of Katniss eating some berries at the end of the first book. As Katniss prepares for the wedding which she is dreading, she is recruited once again to compete in the Hunger Games along with Peeta.

Really?

We’re using the same plot device from the first book? The main appeal of the first book was the suspense of reading about the competition. But by going back in to the Hunger Games, it felt as if Suzanne Collins was acknowledging what made the first book good and just rehashing the same material. I was disappointed. After I finished the book and had some time to think about it, I concluded that Catching Fire serves the purpose of setting up the third act. The story needs to go from point A to point C but along the way it must pass through an awkward point B. There needed to be a transition from Katniss winning the Hunger Games in book one to leading a rebellion in the third book. Much like The Matrix movies, the first entry in the series was good, but as it became a success there came a need to produce sequels which tried to add more complexity to what the first established. As a result we get more of the same in terms of action but the plot seems to take a backseat.

Don’t get me wrong, I liked The Matrix Reloaded just as much as I liked Catching Fire. Both were entertaining, and I don’t regret investing my time with them. In the end, though, I would have been content with just ending the Hunger Games series after the first book. I love/hate books that have nebulous endings. On one hand I want to know what happens to the characters. On the other, leaving a bunch of unanswered questions fosters discussion about the book for years to come. I remember reading The Giver andFahrenheit 451 in high school and being appalled by the openness of their finales but those books had a more lasting impression on me than the other books I was forced to read.

Second Opinions:
Wands and Worlds
Devourer of Books
The Book Smugglers
The Speculative Scotsman

The Hunger Games (Hardcover)
by Suzanne Collins
Scholastic, September 2008
384 Pages

I admit, I’m late to jump on The Hunger Games bandwagon. I wasn’t really aware of the series until Catching Fire was released last year and all the book bloggers I follow were acting as if this was the next best thing since sliced bread, or whatever the literary equivalent would be. It still took me a year to get around to becoming interested enough to take the plunge and read the first book.

Before I get started I have a question I need clarified. This book is about twenty-four kids of various ages (from 12 to 18) brutally murdering each other while everybody watches and cheers them on. Did I get that right? Is this really what the book is about? I can see how one might consider The Hunger Games to be a social commentary on how we as a society have become obsessed with “reality” TV shows like Survivor and Who Wants to be The Biggest Loser?. It could have been a Modest Proposal lampooning reality TV. Instead it fails because one of the reasons this book is so damn compelling is because it’s set up like a reality TV show.

Back to the book at hand, The Hunger Games follows Katniss, a sixteen year old girl from the poorest of the 12 districts, who volunteers to take her sister’s place in the annual Hunger Games. Once inside the arena, she must stay alive in the wilderness while making both allies and enemies. Peeta was also selected from District 12 and his intentions are in question throughout the entire novel. Is he a good guy? Bad guy? Is he in love with Katniss or is it just a ploy for ratings? Again, all good trademarks of “reality” TV shows. The novel is really well paced and full of action. There are explosions and danger around every corner. The reader never knows when Katniss is going to be attacked and by who.

There is an abrupt ending that left me annoyed. Had I read the book when it first came out I would have been downright livid. Luckily, the entire trilogy has been released so the only thing holding me back from finishing the series is the two books I am currently reading.

I do have one MAJOR complaint about the book. If you are one of the few who have not read it just stop reading because the following contains spoilers.

My biggest complaint was that it was too convenient for Katniss not to kill anybody. I know she is the main protagonist and the reader must be able to relate to her, but she hardly makes an attempt to win the games. The other contestants die at the hands of each other while Katniss just sits up in a tree and waits. Since there can only be one winner, the reader goes through the book thinking Katniss and Peeta will have to fight to the death at some point only to have the rules changed and suddenly there could be two winners conveniently saving the two main characters. I just wish that Suzanne Collins would have pushed the character a little bit further and made her actively try to win the games instead of just winning almost by pure luck.

They’re also making a movie based off of the book.

Oh wait, wrong movie. My bad.

Second Opinions:
Bookish Nose
The Broke and the Bookish
Fyrefly’s Book Blog
Dreadlock Girl
Whimpilsive