I picked up this book expecting it to be an average action thriller, which would be quite involving. I was wrong. Although it has become a teenage cult, I found it predictable, dull, unoriginal and riddled with errors. Unfortunately, I cannot think of a single reason to recommend it.
The storyline was very weak and monotonous, veering between long, boring chapters when nothing happens, and characters miraculously escaping from near death situations.
For example, at one point in the book, Katniss, the main protagonist, explains that a tracker-jacker (mutant wasp) sting will either kill you or drive you mad. Apparently "Most people can't tolerate more than a few stings." In that case, how does Katniss manage to survive three stings, with only a few hallucinations? I suspect the storyline of being based on video games, with gratuitous violence forming most of the major events.
The novel is set in a future dystopian world, in a country called 'Panem' with 12 outlying districts surrounding a technologically advanced Capitol. Our heroine, Katniss, is from District 12, the poorest district, whose citizens never do well in the Hunger Games (cliché). She loves her little sister, Prim, more than anyone. Every year a teenage boy and a teenage girl from each district are randomly chosen to compete in the annual Hunger Games, a fight to the death in an arena which has it's own dangers. Only one tribute can survive. Prim is chosen for the games (predictable) and Katniss volunteers in her place.The male tribute is Peeta, who gave Katniss bread from his family's bakery when they were starving (cliché). He also has a crush on her (cliché). When they arrive at the games, there is a lot of danger and action which ends with Katniss saving Peeta's life and them becoming joint winners of the Hunger Games.
It seems that the author put no thought into her choice of perspective, since Katniss's survival is in question, why should she be telling the story in the present tense? Readers get no sense of the other characters feelings, due to Katniss being so self- absorbed, arrogant and careless. I also felt like the book had no moral message, apart from a clumsy metaphor for people's obsession with reality TV. Although Katniss is supposed to mourn the deaths of other tributes her emotions are so badly described as to be almost nonexistent. None of the characters apart from Rue were particularly likeable either, most of them were just clichés who added nothing to the story.
This book could have been written in half the number of words. The entire sequence at the end of the Games, with the pretended romance between Katniss and Peeta, in order to attract sponsors (cliché), is completely wasteful, when Katniss is nursing Peeta, their survival is guaranteed.
It also has many clunky phrases, which are usually tortological, or just grammatically incorrect. For example: "Gale and Peeta do not coexist well together in my thoughts." Other sentences are awfully punctuated: "My bow is a rarity, crafted by my father along with a few others that I keep well hidden in the woods." This sentence means to say that Katniss's bow was crafted by her father, and that she keeps it well hidden, with a few other weapons, in the woods. It actually says that the bow was crafted by her father and "a few others" whom she keeps hidden in the woods.
The idea wasn't even original. Although I haven't seen or read "Battle Royale", the Japanese novel by Koushun Takami, I know from several sources that most of the Hunger Games plot was taken from there. The dystopian setting pays no heed to what environmental collapse may have befallen the world, instead focusing on the unrealistic Capitol technology.
Honestly, I don't know what the editor was thinking, or how it became a bestseller. My advise to anyone is to avoid this book like the plague and don't let crazed, quality illiterate Hunger Games fans tell you otherwise, although I understand that I am in the minority in disliking this novel. I will certainly avoid the sequels, despite the protestations of my friends.
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