Mockingjay Review

Read Catching Fire Sunday night and Mockingjay last night. My review from Goodreads is below. I should be an English major. I loved analyzing stories in my second English class - pulling out ridiculous nuances that the author may or may not have been trying to make a subtle point with. I could totally do that with this book. Take that last paragraph I wrote and analyze the badookers out of this book. It'd be fun. But, since I'm not in an English class, I'm not going to take the time to bother, because in reality is Suzanne Collins' perspective one I care THAT much about. Nope. Not really. Although it does surprise me how basic her website is. With the comparisons of society in her book, though, that only makes sense actually (see the last paragraph below again).

By the way, NO IDEA if there are spoilers in here, so don't read if a subtle hint at the end is not your forte:

Yup, power reading is the way to go for me apparently. Read this in five hours last night.

This may be surprising to hear for some, but for me this book was REALLY slow in the last half. Each sentence had SO MUCH detail but not much really happened in their lives. There was a huge drawn out production, followed by a quick wrap up of a very long period of time. Kind of a let down for the ending for me.

Nonetheless, I am excited to read other works by Suzanne Collins because her visual imagery is absolutely stunning. The entire world is created in my head. I believe that's what makes books like these so popular. When it's so EASY to visualize, connect with the characters, and has so much going on to boot, you can't help but have a cult following. No effort is required to create a grand picture in your head of an amazing, but painful, other world.

Excellent, excellent series. Can't wait to see the movie now!

Update: Actually, delving a little deeper into these books... The picture the author paints of society intrigues me in how in some places it's not so different from our world. She really points out, from the first book to the last, the ridiculous social and fashion customs that society at large occupies themselves with and makes more important than say... people starving or dying. That stark contrast is throughout the entire book and only in the end of the series does it really stick home to how much one is in the dark from the harshness life can be if the shallowness of their lives is all they are concerned with. Very interesting how the author pulled out societal norms and plugged them into extremes to make a subtle comparison between her made up society and the society around us.