Katniss Everdeen woont met haar moeder en haar zusje in het 12e en armste district van Panem. Daar heerst het keiharde regime van het welvarende, brute Capitool. Bij de jaarlijkse Hongerspelen moeten twaalf jongens en twaalf meisjes in een gemanipuleerde arena de strijd aan gaan op leven en dood. Zo begeeft ook Katniss zich onder het oog van de hele bevolking in de gemanipuleerde arena. Gevangen in een meedogenloos web van geweld, gemanipuleerde tv-beelden en corrupte politici staat ze voor de vraag: hoe ver ga je om te overleven?
De Hongerspelen is het eerste deel in de succesvolle trilogie van Suzanne Collins.
With the new Hunger Games movie out, I realized I only ever watched the movies and that was 10 years or so ago. So I decided to give the first book a try and it was... nice. I don't quite understand why it became such a success, though. The book was fine and I remember the movie being fine as well. Might need to re-watch it too. But this global success? Ah, well. If you haven't read the book and feel even slightly curious, give it a go. It's a quick and easy read and it's fine overall.
Book 1 especially is a real page turner as we get inside the mind of a young woman forced by her circumstances to undertake a remarkable challenge so that she can continue to do what she has been doing for much of her life - protecting her family. Seeing events through her interpretations and hearing her thoughts (or memories as I suppose they really are) mean we have a very clear view of her character. The story takes us from her 'selection' through to the end of the 74th Hunger Games. I remember hearing the author on a radio program saying something like "what Katniss does has consequences, which is why it is a trilogy and didn't stop at one book". Certainly at the end of the first book you cannot stop, there are too many questions about what happens next. The second book though is not such a brilliant …
Book 1 especially is a real page turner as we get inside the mind of a young woman forced by her circumstances to undertake a remarkable challenge so that she can continue to do what she has been doing for much of her life - protecting her family. Seeing events through her interpretations and hearing her thoughts (or memories as I suppose they really are) mean we have a very clear view of her character. The story takes us from her 'selection' through to the end of the 74th Hunger Games. I remember hearing the author on a radio program saying something like "what Katniss does has consequences, which is why it is a trilogy and didn't stop at one book". Certainly at the end of the first book you cannot stop, there are too many questions about what happens next. The second book though is not such a brilliant read, but here we begin to get a feel for what is happening outside in the world, rather than just inside in the character. Is this just Katniss maturing, or is there more too it? In the third book we are into revolution and war - a very different set up from the first two and a very different approach by Katniss. For me this third story was the hardest to read, it felt as though some of the characters needed to be removed before the end, and there were increasingly strange ways of killing them, like some sort of bizarre video game. But then that is the world she lives in! That aside there are atrocities for Katniss to come to terms with and her memories become a little fragmented it seemed (as they probably would in the real world, but I was in danger of losing track once or twice). I read all three books in the lead up to my holiday, while I was away and in the few days after, rarely have I been so captivated by a trilogy, so having read them so close together may have skewed my view. Highly recommended if you enjoy this genre.
