The Hunger Games Forum

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As the title suggest I'm curious if anyone here has read these books and if so what did you think of them? Are they any good?

Also based on what you know about the upcoming movie so far do you think the films are following the source material well enough? This one might be difficult to answer since the movie isn't out yet (at the time of this post).

I'm a sci-fi lover myself and I hadn't really heard much about these books nor do I know anyone personally that has read any of them. I'm curious if I should seek these books out for myself and if any of you folks would reccommend them.

Appreciate any input.

They're solid enough. I mean, they're YA, so they're pretty fast reads, but they're more nuanced than what usually hits the mainstream in YA (they're leagues better than Twilight, and less exhaustively overwrought than Harry Potter). The movie looks to be pretty spot on in adapting the first book, curious how they'll do with the others which go more into political/war type territory. But I did like the books, and am looking forward to the movie.

@litrock: Thanks much for the input.

Being a man of 30 my interest in these didn't seem too high but for the audience it's intended for it certainly seems to have a lot more substance than most things kids today would have interest in or what the media would have us believe they have interest in.

@Atary77: Well, I'm late-20s myself, I just try to read things that are going to be topics of discussion in movies/pop culture. Sometimes that's a giant pain (reading Twilight was a very frustrating two or three days), but The Hunger Games are actually worth checking out if you can borrow them from somebody or something. I've certainly read 'adult' books with less interesting thematic material.

@litrock: You poor poor man. Yeah even I couldn't bring myself to read any one of those Twilight books. Hell I made a whole blog as to why I can't stand that whole series (though it was more directed at the movies).

But I'll be very glad if Hunger Games is NOT another Twilight and based on a little research I've done it's certainly not. My impression of it has been Mortal Kombat with kids and teenagers which can sound pretty awesome depending on who you are.

@Atary77: Well, I'm of the opinion that if you're going to trash something and complain about it you owe it to yourself and whoever has to listen to you to at least have some idea what you're talking about. Which involves reading/watching (I don't rag on Bay's Transformer sequels because I didn't watch them, the first was enough to keep me more or less out of that loop forever) it. It's not always fun, but I think there's an onus to not just kneejerk against stuff you presume to be awful. Sometimes (rarely, admittedly, but it DOES happen) I'm surprised, and that's always a great feeling.

The first one is pretty good, the other two are terrible.

@Mr_skeleton: Might I ask, terrible how?

I liked the first two haven't gotten around to reading the third, though from what i've hard it kind of goes off the railes. The main reason I like the first two is there is a logical progression from 1 to 2 and hwo it deals with the nature of sequels.

I personally haven't read the books but learning what they are about makes me want to read the first one. My last girlfriend had read them and suggested them to me but I just sorta ignored her recommendation because she and I didn't like the same things usually. My roommate however suggested I at least read the first since he thought the last two weren't great.

So more than likely I'll read the first one and if it catches my interest I'll continue on. I'm told the romance starts mainly in the second book, so I don't look forward to that.

Not yet. Someone told me they were positioning the series as the next Twilight, which put me a little. However, after hearing good things about the books and movies, I think I should definitely try get myself a copy a some point. For those who've read it, is the style of the author's writing decent, or at the very least bearable? (heard a couple of complaints about this particular point)

@Atary77: Terrible (Twilight levels of awfulness) and forced love triangle that just feels out of place and ruins the protagonists character and the pace of the books. I'm not sure if the author wanted to chase the Twilight money but it's obvious that the second and third books are aimed at that audience.

I've read the first two, working on the third now. I dug the first one a lot, thought the second was pretty good. Third one's alright so far, definitely a lot different than the other ones. There are some pretty good "holy shit, what?" moments littered throughout the books, something I wasn't expecting out a YA series. If you don't dig weird romance/love triangles/teenage angst, though, you might wanna stay away, cause there's plenty. Also, they're surprisingly fucking gory, damn. How bout them tracker jackers in the first book, eh? Eh?

I just got finished reading the first one today. I liked it more then I thought I would.

I'm willing to bet the movies will end up better than the books.

The biggest problem with the books is the poor and uninteresting writing; They actually read more like movie scripts than a good book anyways.

I found Katniss pretty unlikable with how she treats those boys of hers, and it gets worst the farther you get into the series. All in all, I enjoyed them, and the movie is the first movie I've wanted to watch in theaters in a long time. I'll probably end up watching it on blu-ray instead though. I'm not much of a theater-going person.

@Crono11 said:

I just got finished reading the first one today. I liked it more then I thought I would.

Me too! I thought the whole romance thing was pretty cliché, in the same way I tend to not like romance in media. That's a matter of perspective though. A lot of the chapters were very formulaic and that put me off a little. Reaction to events -> Katniss remembering stuff -> something crazy happening ->next chapter: reaction to events....etc.

The gory aspect isn't that bad in my opinion. It's worse than anything in His Dark Materials of Harry Potter, but it's not brutal or horrifying. A lot of what makes something uncomfortably gory for me is that intent behind it and there's only one point in the first book where there's even a hint of intentional maiming. It probably is gory for a YA audience though.

Predictable, but thoroughly enjoyable.

Yes i've read them, really enjoyed them. I don't get much of the hate about the second and third books though. The second one was my favourite.