The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1) in Book Riot's Read Harder Challenge

Jan 09, 2012 Kerry rated it really liked it

Here's the deal. I'm skeptic about:
1. Fantasy or sci-fi-ish and futuristic books
2.Popular books living up to the hype
3. Books with black covers (I know! I know! Don't judge a book by its cover....I think some awful Gulag book in college had a black cover and my bias is the price I have to pay)

Here's the deal....this is an enthralling, block out the world kind of read that deserves your attention. I was reading the ending on an airplane and I think an utterly unappealing person fell asleep next ...more

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Feb 15, 2011 Martin rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2011books

Everything that my friends told me about this book being a nonstop thrill ride was right on. Gripping, incessant, first-person narration makes this impossible to put down, and Suzanne Collins packs more action into this slim volume than I've enjoyed in the last ten books I've read, combined.

Yet, I have to ask about the marketing of this as a Young Adult book. It's a Young Adult book for the Young Adult that really loved Cormac McCarthy's The Road. And that's honestly only a partial joke; overall Everything that my friends told me about this book being a nonstop thrill ride was right on. Gripping, incessant, first-person narration makes this impossible to put down, and Suzanne Collins packs more action into this slim volume than I've enjoyed in the last ten books I've read, combined.

Yet, I have to ask about the marketing of this as a Young Adult book. It's a Young Adult book for the Young Adult that really loved Cormac McCarthy's The Road. And that's honestly only a partial joke; overall, this book is just about .35 shades lighter than The Road, and certainly features more violence. The MWBA (Martin Wilson Book Association) rates this book a hard R. Appeal it if you like, but the violence and bleakness are way beyond anything I'd allow a young adult under my purview to read. I suppose this all hinges on the question of what, exactly, constitutes a Young Adult. And I guess I'm removed enough from my early high school career to truly recall my maturity level and ability to digest fiction. But wow. This is a pretty brutal, nasty, post-apocalyptic YA novel.

I sort of wish we could just call it a plain old novel, but then we'd have to criticize some of the simplicities that Collins gets away with by shielding herself under the nebulous YA umbrella. It's an interesting dance of marketing, expectations, writing, and popularity.

The cynical part of me wants to say it's nothing but a poor-man's Cormac McCarthy, written shamelessly and openly begging to be adapted into a movie (franchise) by a writer who can't hang in the big-kid playground of Science Fiction and so hides out as an 800-lb gorilla in the sandbox of Young Adult Fiction.

The more reasonable side of me thinks that while it could be a little more nuanced for the adult side of the young adult spectrum (and could stand to enumerate every single feeling of the sixteen-year-old protagonist/narrator a little less) it's still a thrilling and enjoyable sci-fi tale with plenty of contemporary resonance -- in the manner of all the best science fiction. An ass-kicking female protagonist, a richly imagined (if depressing) future world, and nearly perfect plotting add up to a great read for anyone of any age. And by "any age" I mean anybody old enough and mature enough not to get terrifying nightmares from all the brutal violence (like I did). ...more

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Feb 07, 2011 Ryan rated it it was amazing

Shelves: childrens-lit, fiction, 2011, multiple-reads, 2012

Wow...evokes thoughts of BATTLE ROYALE and THUNDERDOME. I can't remember the last time a book had me staying up late and getting up early in the hopes of finishing it. I'm left really curious as to where the rest of the series will go!
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Jun 18, 2011 Kirsten rated it really liked it

Friends have had mixed reviews, but I really enjoyed this and am curious to see where the trilogy goes (now if I can just track down a copy of Catching Fire...).

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Aug 19, 2011 Adriel rated it really liked it

Shelves: fantasy

This book has left me exhausted due in part to having stayed up two nights in a row reading until wee hours and then getting up with my toddler at 6:30. In greater part however, this book is such an emotional roller coaster, leaving me with great affection for the character, but feeling a little abused about the awful circumstances she was put through. Not to mention the moral conflict of reading a book critical of the games that it portrays in detail. Although this all sounds critical, i did lo ...more

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Apr 22, 2011 Arianna rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites, borrowed

The best of Battle Royale and Lord of the Flies meets Survivor. Really engaging; couldn't put it down.

[Funny...there seem to be 2 reviews of this book, one I reviewed on & one I didn't. That shouldn't happen, but I can't figure out how to combine them. Hrm.]
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