Review: Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins

Cover: 4

Characters: 5

Plot: 4

Setting: 4

Writing: 5

SUMMARY

Young Katniss Everdeen has survived the dreaded Hunger Games not once, but twice, but even now she can find no relief. In fact, the dangers seem to be escalating: President Snow has declared an all-out war on Katniss, her family, her friends, and all the oppressed people of District 12. The thrill-packed final installment of Suzanne Collins' Hunger Games trilogy will keep young hearts pounding.

REVIEW

This ending was thrilling. There was so much action, so much rebellion, and everything was so fast-paced that I was scrambling to keep up. I actually did this book for one of my projects. I'd snap a picture and show you the very lame cover that I drew up at the last minute, but it's hanging in my LAL classroom, taunting me everyday.

Anyway, in this book, since I've never actually read the ending to a dystopian series until this one, I was expecting high drama and for everything to be wrapped up into one tiny neat little package. I've read conclusions to many other books that aren't dystopian, and they were all wrapped up neatly. This one, of course, was definitely wrapped up neatly. 

In this, Katniss decides who she'll end up with. I was debating Peeta and Gale because I liked them both equally, and I usually choose the guy who hasn't been the girl's best friend for a while, but I usually also choose the one who's more rebellious, who is secretly extremely tortured and actually deep and has many secrets. But who doesn't like the rebellious types?

In the end, I ended up favoring Gale a little more, just because he was the hot and mysterious bad boy who was secretly very deep. (I see it so many times in YA books, especially in love triangles, but I still love them. ;)) No spoilers in this post, so I'm going to say that Katniss's choice was very quick and was resolved near the end. I think that everything was crammed into the last few chapters that it was a little hard to keep track of everything, but nevertheless, it was still very well-written.

All I can say is that the Hunger Games movie will actually include all three books, like in Harry Potter, because what we usually see in the media world these days is that they'll make a movie of the first book, and even if that movie was great, you'll barely see the sequel be produced into a next novel. But this series really does deserve to be made into a full three-part movie production.

Five Snowflakes

Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins

Cover: 4

Characters: 5

Plot: 5

Setting: 5

SUMMARY

Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark won the annual competition described in Hunger Games, but the aftermath leaves these victors with no sense of triumph. Instead, they have become the poster children for a rebellion that they never planned to lead. That new, unwanted status puts them in the bull's-eye for merciless revenge by The Capitol...

REVIEW

From this summary, you don't really know a lot of what's going on in the book. This basically only had covered the first part of the book because during the Victory Tour, the tour for the victors, some things happen and then it leads to a string of activities which then leads to the beginning of Mockingjay and so forth. I don't want to spoil it, so just read the book.

Like the last book, Catching Fire didn't lack action at all. I expected it to have less action than the Hunger Games, since they were no longer in the arena, but it didn't at all. I was at the edge of my seat throughout the entire book. Everything was just so exciting and the plot was so well thought out. The characters were already very well developed in the first books, but the new characters that we were introduced to were just as well developed and I loved every last character and I was so sad to see some of them die in the end.

The setting is so well described that I really felt the mood of each district, and the scenery was extremely vivid and in short, I loved loved loved loved loved the way Ms. Collins described everything. The concepts of the book were also extremely well thought-out, and I could tell the author spent a lot of consideration making up these settings and ideas.

This is no less worse the Hunger Games in my opinion. In fact, it just gets more exciting. If you think the Hunger Games were intense, wait till you read Catching Fire!

Five Snowflakes

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

Just as a warning: this review will be spoilery, so in case you haven't read the Hunger Games and don't want to have some of the plot ruined for you, don't read this review.)

SUMMARY

Twenty-four are forced to enter. Only the winner survives. In the ruins of a place once known as North America lies the nation of Panem, a shining Capitol surrounded by twelve outlying districts. Each year, the districts are forced by the Capitol to send one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen to participate in the Hunger Games, a brutal and terrifying fight to the death - televised for all of Panem to see.

Survival is second nature for sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen, who struggles to feed her mother and younger sister by secretly hunting and gathering beyond the fences of District 12. When Katniss steps in to take the place of her sister in the Hunger Games, she knows it may be her death sentence. If she is to survive, she must weigh survival against humanity and life against love.

WINNING WILL MAKE YOU FAMOUS. LOSING MEANS CERTAIN DEATH.

REVIEW

Good God, who doesn't love this book? Katniss is the ideal heroine and Peeta's just so sweet with the "I've loved you ever since I first saw you" bit. That usually annoys me a little bit. (Take Shatter Me for instance) But in this case, I just loved it and I was oohing and ahing and crying. Peeta's an awesome character. 

In this book, Prim, Katniss's little sister, gets chosen for the reaping, and Katniss takes her place. Peeta is chosen on the boys side. Together, they end up being real contenders with the help of their alcoholic mentor, Haymitch, and others, like Effie Trinket and Cinna. This concept, the idea of a love triangle (Gale, Katniss's best friend, is in love with Katniss) and a dystopian world, also post-apocalyptic, is really ingenious and I fell in love with the book as soon as I found out that Katniss would do anything, and I mean anything, to protect the ones that she loves. 

In the end, it's announced that two people from the same district can win if they are both left standing. It's mainly so the viewers of the Hunger Games can fantasize Peeta and Katniss getting together. In the end, the rules are changed, and Katniss and Peeta end up having this fight about who's going to die and who wins, and they figure out this plan for both of them to die, but at the last second, they're both declared winners.

You'd think this is the end, that's it's just a stand-alone novel, right? Wrong! That little bit where Katniss devises a plan for both of them to die (I won't reveal it since I've exploited so much of the plot already) causes this rebellion that blows over into the second and third book. All I have to say is that this book did not lack any action at all, and neither does the second and third book. Guys, this truly is a book that you'll enjoy over and over again.

Five Snowflakes