The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

In the ruins of a place once known as North America lies the nation of Panem, the shining Capitol surrounded by twelve outlying districts. The Capitol is harsh and keeps the districts in line by forcing them all to send one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen to participate in the annual Hunger Games, a fight to the death on live TV.

Sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen regards it as a death sentence when she steps forward to take her sister's place in the Games. But Katniss has been close to dead before--and survival, for her, is second nature. Without really meaning to, she becomes a contender. But if she is to win, she will have to start making choices that weigh survival against humanity and life against love.

I ignored the hype that was the Hunger games for quite a while and even turned down an invitation from a friend to go and see the movie but like most things, I eventually got sucked into it one night when my husband and I were looking for a movie to watch.  It was a good movie.  I was worried that it would be a poor version of the classic movie Battle Royale or the love triangle of Twilight but it stood on it's own two feet.

I was then inspired to read the book on the back of the movie as I wanted just a bit more background and details on the characters and overall story.  The book gave me this.  It was well written and flowed very well.

Part I allowed us to meet "The Tributes" giving us a good background of the main characters and the reasoning behind the Hunger games.  This part was not covered in as much detail in the movie so it was interesting for me to get a better feel for Katniss and Peeta, the two main characters.

Part II was the actual games and made up the majority of the movie.  It was suitably graphic without being too much so - I guess it is aimed at Young Adults so was less graphic than it could have been.  I was disappointed at some of the detail that had been left out the movie but glad I read the book to pick it up.

Part III the story of the Victors and, I guess, the lead up to the second book in the trilogy.  A bit predictable but I am hoping that it is just setting a certain scene that will be developed latter on.

I am not sure what the justification behind writing this as three books rather than one large book - was it to split it up or just to make more money.  You can't say that the book would have been too long otherwise or you just have to look at each of the Game of Throne books to know that they work at over 1000 pages each.  I would have preferred to just have one book to keep on reading as I now have to re-motivate myself to read the next two.  Although on the plus side, I can put it down and read something else and then go back to it, something I would not do if it were one whole book.  Slightly torn on that one.

An interesting read and I am really looking forward to finding out more about how Panem came about, I just hope the author covers that.  My fear is that she doesn't and it ends up just another predictable love triangle story similar to Twilight. 4 out of 5.