I’m so glad to have read a young adult novel that doesn’t make me feel old. This book is a quick read, and a good one, too. A dystopian future for North America, with a sacrificial games element. I’ve also read Gregor the Overlander by Collins, and I applaud the way she can create darkness and maintain that darkness in a story that still contains all the regular tropes of young adult fiction. I’m already on the second one, Catching Fire, and am breezing happily through that book as well.
Students have been listing this as their favorite book ever since it came out in 2008. But students also told me to read Twilight, and…yeah. I don’t always take their reading advice. It’s tricky reading young adult fiction as an “old” adult now — those books are no longer written for me. They contain plot points or characters who I find tedious because I’ve seen them before in countless other novels. It just gets boring after a while, feeling like “they don’t write them like they used to.” They need those elements, however, to instruct their young readers on what book reading is like, what you can hope to take from it, and how to write. The amount of times I’ve told students that I DON’T want to know what everyone is wearing in their short stories…Gack! But I know where they get that idea from, and it’s a good idea for their age — keep them observing and thinking about details that belong in a story.
Rant! Back to reality — I really enjoyed this book because I did NOT feel like I’d read it all before. Sure, you’re able to kind of guess the ending before you get to it, but Collins surprised me at times too.
I’m curious to see how the main character, Katniss, will mature in the next two books. There’s a trend in young adult fiction now to have a female main character who in some way doesn’t recognize how special she is. It could be that she doesn’t know how beautiful she is, or doesn’t understand her full potential. But this lack of self-esteem is a central part of these characters, and that worries me. Is a girl really only beautiful if she doesn’t know it? Can a girl who doesn’t know how smart she is really be that smart? Do we only appreciate young women who are humble or completely self-aware? Hmm. I’ll report back on whether this develops or not. It’s continuing in the next book, but I’m hoping it will be part of her journey to become more self-aware and more self-confident about everything, not just her prowess at hunting.
Right now, I’m excited that they’re making this into a movie. And the casting looks spot on, which is a real treat. My advice would be to not check out the movie pictures yet until you’ve read the book — it’s a good read, it won’t take long — and then get a pleasant surprise when the cast looks almost like you pictured them in your head. Pretty cool.
I also found out from a little peek on Wikipedia that Suzanne Collins was a writer for Nickelodeon AND wrote for one of my favorite shows when I was in middle school, Clarissa Explains It All. Well, now I’m a real fan. Plus, that picture takes me back. I bet that’s exactly what Drew and I would have looked like, if we’d studied together in middle school.
I’ll keep you posted when I finish the next book, which should be….wait for it….almost done…
knitquip 