jethrien

Title: The Hunger Games
Author: Suzanne Collins
Genre: YA dystopia
Thingummies: 5

Synopsis: Every year, each district in Panem must send two of their children to Capitol as tribute to play in the bloody gladiator survival contest called the Hunger Games. When Katniss' little sister Primrose is chosen, she volunteers to take Prim's place. The other tribute, Peeta, is a boy that the fierce Katniss has some very mixed feelings about. She had better sort them out fast, because only one of them will be allowed to survive.

Thingummies: Wow. This really is YA crack.

I'm not going to claim that phrasing is lyrical or the themes deep. This is just 100% turbo-charged, id-driven story. There's action and adventure and angst, falling all over themselves. Katniss is someone who thinks that she's all grown up but still has a lot of growing up left to do, and her coming of age is deeply compelling stuff. Some of the heart-string tugging you can totally see coming a mile away. (I called Rue the moment I saw her.) But it's ok. It's still effective, and it works hard enough that it doesn't feel like cheap emotional manipulation.

When you then throw in both kid-surviving-in-the-wilderness tropes and really fantastic descriptions of amazing costumes, you pretty much win my inner twelve-year-old forever.

Ok, it's not like we haven't seen much of this before. I swear, YA dystopic fiction is practically a genre unto itself. Usually, it's not quite this bloody, of course. Collins' characters die, and a lot of them die hard. Some of them shockingly so. But I think it works and it's necessary. In adolescence, everything feels heightened and of life-changing importance. Here, it genuinely is. The popular kids really are ganging up to kill you. You really had better make the right choice of boyfriend or you might die. No one understands you and you can't explain, because to do so is literally treason. And all the grownups really are playing a game they haven't deigned to tell you the rules for.

So the ideas aren't terribly new. It's just that the execution is perfectly done. This book accomplishes exactly the goals it sets for itself. The characters are genuinely compelling. We can see things that the narrator can't, but we can understand why she can't (or can't allow herself to) see them herself. The suspense is terrific. There's a lot that is exceedingly convenient for dramatic purposes about the set-up of the Games--but that makes perfect sense within the context of the book. Of course people will get trapped or rescued at the most dramatic moment--from the very beginning, we know Capitol is meddling for the most dramatic situations possible. What's so appealing is how Katniss learns to manipulate this to her own benefit.

I've got another two books of the series to inhale. I can't wait.