The Hunger Games – Suzanne Collins

Team Peeta

I always purchase book series with caution. I tend to buy them only when they are being raved about. The last time I did that I was severely let down (I am looking at you, 50 Shades of Grey).

Luckily, I was right to read The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. I was sucked in by every single aspect of it. I was horrified by the overall concept even though I had already seen it in the movie Battle Royale. I was sucked in by the love story and thrashed my favour between the two male protagonists (I ended on team Peeta, in case you were wondering). I fell for every, single cliffhanger, reading well into the night despite knowing I would pay the price with exhaustion.

The first book was exceptionally addictive. Luckily, it forced me so far in love with the characters that there was no way I wasn’t going to be able to read the other two in the trilogy, because they do get slightly tiresome. Towards the end of the second book I was reminded of a time in Harry Potter where I thought “Really!? Could anything else bad happen to this boy! Give him a break J.K!” Main character Katniss has the worst luck since Bella Swan and that can become very frustrating.

I also struggled with the pace of the last book. Collins flits between fast and slow paced montages of activity that I found slightly irritating. There were huge chunks where nothing much happened and then within two pages huge amounts of action had occurred.

If you like Harry Potter and Twilight then add this one of your list of things to read. It is a little bit tweenie (credit to Bexber Southern for that description) but the writing is good and the story is gripping in the best bits and only vaguely annoying in the worst.