The Hunger Games

A week and a half ago I started reading the first book in the Hunger Games trilogy.  I'm a little behind the times, apparently.  I hadn't really heard of the books until I first saw the preview for the upcoming movie.  My good friend Roz recommended that I read the books, and then my cousin Sigal wrote a blog post to the opposite effect.  Even with as busy as we were last week, by Wednesday night I was done with the first book.  I immediately bought and downloaded the second book onto my Kindle and started reading it on Thursday morning.  I was itching to read it at every possible opportunity, and we were happily otherwise occupied for most of the rest of the week.  By Monday afternoon, after sitting and reading for almost four hours, I finished the second book.  After doing a few productive things, I started the third book on Monday evening, and finished it this morning.  I'm really glad that I waited to start reading the books until all three were published (kind of like I did with the Twilight books), or I would have gone nuts in between!

Having read all three books in a week and a half, I was pretty immersed into the world created by Suzanne Collins.  I'm actually feeling at a bit of a loss right now that there isn't more to read about these characters.  I really enjoyed the books...they are very readable, the story is very engaging, and the character development is great.  I really feel like I personally know these people and what they went through.  What I don't quite understand, similar to what my cousin wrote in her blog, is how this is a young adult book.  It's quite violent, and addresses some very adult topics.  It was fine for me as an adult (of sorts...), and I can't imagine reading it as a twelve year old.

I'm really looking forward to seeing how Hollywood brings this world to life.  There's a lot of opportunity for some pretty amazing effects, costumes and acting.

If you haven't read these books, I do highly recommend them.  But be warned, you may get sucked in and be totally unproductive and anti-social while you're reading them!

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