The Hunger Games
The Hunger Games is a book about a girl, Katniss Everdeen, who lives in District 12. She lives with her mother, a doctor who works from home, and her younger sister, Primrose Everdeen. There are twelve districts that are punished by the government everyday with poverty because of an unsuccessful uprising by the people. Every year, there is the annual hunger games for two people from each district. They are chosen at random to enter a competition in which they will win endless food for their family for a year. However, this competition is a fight to the death. On the day of the reaping, the unthinkable happens: Primrose Everdeen is chosen as a competitor. Katniss, jumps out of the crowd offering herself as a competitor instead. Katniss and Peeta Mellark are the tributes from District 12. They are now in charge of training to the best of their ability in order to hold onto their lives before they enter the capitol.
!!!!SPOILER ALERT!!!!!
The central theme of The Hunger Games is man v. self. Throughout the book, Katniss has to deal with many different things. She voluntarily entered herself into The Hunger Games in order to save her younger sister Primrose from being thrown into it. She now has to trust that her mother and sister can take care of themselves without her finding them food all the time. Katniss also has to decide which types of emotion to show while in the games. The other tribute from District 12, Peeta Mellark, has decided that he doesn’t want to make it seem like the capitol owns him; if he dies, he says, he wants to die as himself, not as a robot that the capitol has created for entertainment. Katniss decides to show no emotion, not to cry or to seem weak to the people watching or to her competitors. She told her sister, Prim, that she would try and win for them. This means that she will have to do anything possible to win. Katniss also has to decide whether or not she wants to trust anyone during the games. She has been taught by Haymitch to act like she trusts Peeta. However, later in the games, she battles with his loyalty to her. Characterization of Katniss shows that without her crucial decision-making skills, she wouldn’t have been able to survive the games. Katniss was forced to change her approach to the Hunger games many times. For example, before the hunger games started, she seemed emotionless and very strong. However, once the games started, she started to trust more people like Rue. After Peeta had announced his prolonged love for Katniss, she gave into kissing him throughout the games. These acts have gotten her far with people like Haymitch sending her gifts that helped her survival. The audience loved her which was part of what allowed her to win the games.
Peeta also battled with man v. self. He didn’t want to lose himself during the games. He immediately made it seem like he was against Katniss after announcing his love for her by joining a group of people out to get her. Katniss had overheard some of their conversations and was angered by this. However, it is later shown that he was looking out for her all along. When his group had targeted Katniss, he helped her escape. Katniss and Peeta made decisions that helped them survive the entire games. They both battled with how they would portray themselves in front of a large audience and to their competitors. Man v. self was clear in the decisions they both made.
I believe that The Hunger Games was a great book. The idea was extremely creative and gruesome, yet not so gruesome as to discourage some readers from reading it. I enjoyed the characterization of Katniss Everdeen. I believe that she is a strong person and is easily idolized by readers. I thought that the book was very descriptive enough so I could picture the scenes in my mind, which is always an important aspect of books, for me. The Hunger Games was entertaining and made me want to keep reading. Despite The Hunger Games’ popularity and success, I was not happy with the way it ended. The ending was a definite cliff hanger. I was not happy, however, with the way that the capitol changed the rules of the ending of the games more than once. That seemed annoying to me. Also, I didn’t like how Katniss changed her mind at the end about whether she actually felt something for Peeta or whether it was all for show during the competition. I thought the author leaving us with that until the next book was cruel and unusual punishment. I have yet to start reading the second book in the trilogy, but I am hoping that Katniss and Peeta get together. Or it may even be cool to see a fight between Gale and Peeta. What if they held another hunger games for Gale and Peeta and the winner got to be with Katniss!? Unfortunately that probably will not happen.
I would recommend this book to anyone above the age of thirteen who enjoys a good story. The gruesome details about each kill the tributes made might be a little graphic for some but the overall plot outweighs the sadness of death throughout the book. People who enjoyed the Harry Potter series and the Twilight trilogy would enjoy these books. If you are someone who has trouble suspending disbelief, then it might be difficult to enjoy the book.
I definitely can say that I am eager to start reading the next two books. I am even more eager to see the movie as well. There are so many aspects of the book that I enjoyed including characterization of Katniss and Peeta and the imagery that the author included. Books like these make me more interested in reading than I have been in a long time.
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