Chaos, Coffee & a Bookshelf: Serial Review: The Hunger Games

I was late to the party reading the Hunger Games Trilogy, but I am soo glad I did!

The Hunger Games

by Suzanne Collins

Scholastic Press

From Goodreads:

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 weigh survival against humanity and life against love.

My Thoughts:

After reading the Hunger Games I felt like it was a really good book. It wasn't my normal read but I really enjoyed it. It could have ended there. Suzanne Collins didn't have to finish this series. If I understand correctly from the Acknowledgments at the end of Mockingjay, she didn't initially intend to keep going. But I am so very glad she did. The Hunger Games was good, but I had this feeling that there could have been more. I wasn't completely sure what I wanted that "more" to be, though.

So I started reading Catching Fire and I knew. This was it, this was what I wanted when I had been reading the first book. Catching Fire had the backstory, the deeper connections between characters, and dynamics that were complicated and interesting. I loved Catching Fire so much that I more or less took a snack break and then picked up Mockingjay. I simply had to know how this ended.

If I thought Catching Fire "got better" as I told one friend, then Mockingjay simply knocked it out of the park for me. I loved every twist and turn that came about in Mockingjay. It was perfect. I couldn't have asked for anything more by the time I finished with this one.

I am not including the synopsis for Catching Fire and Mockingjay because I made the mistake of reading them before I finished the first book and I hate spoilers. I prefer to find things out for myself. So if you haven't read them yet, I don't want to be the one who spoils anything for you!

This series is a must read, and you simply have to read the whole thing! If I were rating the book individually then I would give 4 cups to The Hunger Games and Chasing Fire, and 5 cups to Mockingjay. I just can't do that though, I have to rate the series as a whole because now that I am done that is the only way to read it! I give it 5 cups!