Ever since late last year, when the 'Hunger Games' film first started getting advertised, people seemed genuinely hyped for its release. If people get hyped for something like that, then my curiosity on what its all about usually gets the better of me. The thing was, the people liking this idea so much seemed to be about 95% female, so I honestly wondered if we had a new 'Twilight' on our hands. I read around more into what it was about though, and then got really curious about it. I can't deny that the concept sounded really cool to me. Eventually, I walked in, took a look at the book, and there on the back, Stephen King himself positively reviewed it. I finally just gave in, bought it, and read it within about a week, wanting to get through it before the film's release. 'The Hunger Games' tells the story of Katniss Everdeen, a 16-year-old girl who fends for her mother and 12-year-old sister, Primrose, after their father died in a bad coal mining accident. Taking place some centuries in the future after an apocalyptic event, North America has been split into 12 districts. The whole of the nation is now called Panem. Years previous to the book's timeline, there was a District 13 who had an uprising against the Capitol (the richest and most prominent area of Panem). As punishment for this event, the Capitol wiped them out and now hosts an annual "Hunger Games" in which one boy and one girl from each of the 12 districts between the ages of 12 and 18, known as "Tributes" must compete in a giant arena, killing one another off until one emerges the victor. The kids are chosen by a random lottery, and the victor will end up rich and well fed. This story takes place during the 74th Annual Hunger Games. When Primrose's name is called during the lottery draw for District 12, Katniss, a loving sister to whom Prim means the world, volunteers to take her place, and the adventure begins. The book is split up into three parts; 'The Tributes', where our story begins and they take us through general preparation for the games, 'The Games', which is pretty self-explanatory, and 'The Victor' which obviously closes the book. I really enjoyed the story, but I have to admit to a couple of nitpicks about it. For one, I dreaded the writing style when I first got into it. I like to read a story as if it's being read in the past tense, be it by a narrator or from first person. This one reads from first person, but it's completely present tense, ie the opening sentence; "When I wake up, the other side of the bed is cold". It's kind of like the main actor in a movie reading out a storyboard before filming. However, I did manage to get my head around the writing style pretty quickly when the story started to pick up and just shrug it off. The other thing is the way it ends. Without spoiling anything, I'll say I like a good cliffhanger to a series, but it seems to literally bridge over to the next book. I'd say a great cliffhanger to a book would be something like 'Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire'. It closes, but you are given really exciting information about Voldemort's return, the first death in one of the books occurs, and you think "Damn, shit's getting real! I really wanna read the next book to see what happens next!" This one ends with something very interesting that could happen in the next book, but there's no real close to it. It just feels like too much of a gap is left there. Getting the next book seems more of an obligation than a desire. Not that I don't wanna read the next book, don't get me wrong, I just feel that the driving force behind me reading it is the big gap I want filled in more so than waiting in anticipation to see what happens next. Some beef other guys might have with this particular read is that there is some romantic involvement, but it's not gonna be like reading a 'Twilight' book, nor is it at all even a full-fledged love story. The story itself IS really great, showing a girl's love for her sister throwing her into an arena with 23 other kids who have to kill one another. I love the way the chapters end, they almost always make you want to move onto the next because they're almost always cliffhangers of sorts. Maybe the fact that the chapters all seemed to end like that provides the reason I nitpick about the end of the whole book. It's full of action and strategy, rather scary moments (two words, Tracker Jackers), and I have to admit there were moments that I genuinely felt my heart strings get pulled. I'll say that this book is well worth a read, and it's an easy read as well. You can tell it's more aimed toward a female audience, however, it's not something I'd say guys need to avoid at all. There's plenty of action and violence here, and the story is relatable enough to just about anyone. It's about survival, friendship, family, and love surrounding the shocking concept of throwing kids who are too young to die into an arena to kill each other, and how they must handle it. For me, it's no 'Harry Potter' story, but I really enjoyed it a lot, and I look forward to reading the next.
Final Rating: 4.5/5