should i read the hunger games y/n

Okay KHV SO

as some of you know I work in a movie theater. Part of that job is cleaning up after movies, so I end up listening to a lot of credits music. I liked two of the songs in the Catching Fire credits so I grabbed the soundtrack, which has some other solid tracks. I thought to myself "hey maybe you should go see this movie," having had a passing interest in Hunger Games just because I wanted to see what all the hooplah was about. I'm also intrigued by its having a female protagonist, though I have heard some feminist critiques of where the sequels go (but I'd like to judge for myself).

I'm also going to school for adolescent English education so I figure I should get an idea of WHAT DA KIDZ LIKE 2 READ

People tell me to watch the movies but I like to read (a lot) & would rather read the books first. I've always been kinda stopped because I don't like the way they're written, though I imagine they'd be a pretty fast read.

sooooo my question to y'all is: if you have read the books, would you recommend them? Or should I just watch the movies? Is the narrative structure of the books as irritating as it seems, or did you get into it?

edit plz no spoils even though i think i know the basic plot of the first book

 

I would. It's one of my favorite book series out there.

Of course, that's just me.

 

I'm not a big fan of the books. Hell, I'm not a fan. If you're looking for a well written female protagonist, watch the movies, they do characterization so much better than the books. Katniss goes through very little change in the books; the way she starts in the certain book is who she will be through the rest of that book to the very end. Basically, in the novels, she's Bella with a bow.

I will say that Catching Fire is the only well written book in the series, and is worth a read. Mockingjay is just a disappointment with a lot of padding (in fact, CF and MJ could have been just one book if they weren't padded out so much).

 

Well the mere fact that she is a female protagonist is pretty exceptional, to me. I have heard some criticisms like I said but I'm curious to judge for myself. By well-written, do you mean her character develops very little? I'm not opposed to her being a fairly static character, if her initial character is solid. The Bella comparison does bother me (the world does not need another Bella Swan dear lord), would you mind expanding at all on it? :x

I have heard that there is a lot of filler in the final two novels, yeah. I've also heard that fans can be rather divided over the two. On the other hand, I read an article that compared Catching Fire to Empire Strikes Back, wanna see if it's worth even standing in Empire's shadow heh.

The paperback box set is cheaper than I expected & I have more money in my bank account than I thought so I might pick 'em up. Curious still to hear opinions!

 

As someone who never read the books and enjoyed the films, I dunno.

 

thank you for your input haya you have been a tremendous help xoxo

 

Okay, I'll try to remember everything. It's been a while since I last read the books. I wouldn't call Katniss a solid character. Although she is the narrator, I felt nothing for her throughout most of the series. I had no reason to root for her. She just seemed like a Mary Sue that was pretty clueless when you know that she knows better (just like Bella).

I do say that Catching Fire just had a better story, had more fleshed out characters, but I still have to say that Katniss is just a boring protagonist. I want to root for her to succeed, but I need a reason why. The Catching Fire movie did a much better job than the books did.

I will say it's not the worst series out there, but that doesn't take away my lukewarm feeling to it. I mean, I have a friend who liked the first book but absolutely hates the sequels. It's really one of those series that depends on person to person,

 

But for a non-answer to your question, I've found that when it comes to films adapted from books, it seems like you should just go with one or the other, because I always hear complaints from readers that the films never live up to the books, hence why I sometimes avoid them in the first place (that and I always get distracted from finishing books.)

Still, you could do far worse than The Hunger Games trilogy. They seem decent enough for a read.

 

My college keeps forcing me to write papers about the first book, so I've got an opinion on it
The book is incredibly rushed. There's little to no breathing room at all. No time for character development or really anything, it's like going through a list. Characters we're meant to sympathize with when they die are basically sympathetic because the book tells us they are, there's just so little time to develop anything.
Here's a minor example: there's a character during the games that Katniss befriends. In a matter of HOURS this person trusts Katniss so completely she's willing to sleep in the same sleeping back as her. The only reason we're given for why Katniss cares about this person is because she reminds her of her sister, who is in turn given no development beyond them simply telling us "Oh EVERYBODY LOVES Katniss' sister"
The movie is even worse in many ways, a movie of a book will always be rushed, but the book was already rushed so it almost becomes an abridged series. Yet they add a bunch of scene.
I'll never understand Katniss being viewed as such a strong female character. The only really positive characteristic is her maternal skills, which I'm fairly certain isn't generally accepted as a strong feminist type deal. Besides that she's just kinda angry or manipulative all the time. The only reason her character is even able to be the hero is because the story contrives itself in such a way that she never has to do anything 'bad' sure, she kills a bunch of kids, but it's only the one dimensionally evil kids and even then it's almost always self defense or treated as a mercy.
The games themselves raise a tonne of questions about the logistics of the story, too. From the question of why these games encourage 12-18 year olds to be constantly prepared for improv combat despite the fact that these games are supposed to stop rebellion. Why it's kids in the first place, when that just makes them more sympathetic whereas an older person would more likely be ignored or justified. And the sci fi stuff introduced begins to raise the question of why they even need twelve working districts
Now I've only read the first book and seen the first movie
But honestly, it seems like this is something you should be reading/watching, judging by your line of work, and keep in mind I've been forced to go over this stuff a tonne of times, so I'm just sick of it by now, you'll probably like it a fair bit more than me

 

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Interesting! Honestly, a lot of this stuff seems rather typical the young adult literature I've read. Character development & plausibility are rarely at the forefront; one can call it lazy or poor writing, but I think it could be partly attributed to the nature of the audience. Young adult readers are quite imaginative, I think--they're more willing to fill in the blanks on their own. One look at fanfiction.net, AO3, or tumblr will definitely tell you that: part of it is what you bring to the story. That's also a defense of relatively bland protagonists: they are inoffensive so that the reader can insert themselves. This kind of thing doesn't really fly in literature or adult fiction, where we have expectations for more nuanced or layered narratives. But I think YA literature having that deficit isn't necessarily a bad thing, because it encourages imagination and involvement on the reader's part.

This isn't, of course, to say that YA literature can't have fantastic characters (coughcoughHARRYPOTTERcough), or that more adult-oriented novels can't be imaginative for the reader. I just find it very pronounced within YA lit. And that's why I'm happy to see YAs reading even Twilight, because at least they're reading and imagining and using their brains (okay, Twilight might not be a good example there heheh).

 

I read the trilogy in high school and enjoyed them. There have been plenty of fair criticisms leveled at the books (as well as some not so fair) given their popularity, but in my opinion Katniss isn't an outright weak protagonist in and of herself; there's just an entire "do I choose this boy or this boy!!?" subplot that gets harped on way too much considering the dire circumstances. It can make her come off as somewhat manipulative, and there were times I remember being irritated with her actions -- although a protagonist making mistakes is by no means bad writing (quite the opposite in fact if done right), I think the issue here is that the intention was for the reader to sympathize with her, not get angry at her indecisiveness. Personally I would never put her on the same level as Bella, but I think one's ability to enjoy the series can hinge on how much of the "love triangle" you can tolerate.

If you don't like the writing style though then I think that's that? The books may not be for you. I would maybe try to get through the first one and see what you think. If you don't like it, then skip out on the rest (although to be fair Catching Fire is generally considered the strongest installment as far as I can tell. It's been long enough that I probably couldn't tell you myself :v ). To be perfectly honest I feel like you may not like them, but I'm bad at discerning people's tastes I think, hah.

 

The problem is The Hunger Games wants to be a cautionary tale, drawing painfully obvious analogies to various injustices of the 3rd world as well as symbols of 1st world decadence like reality TV.
Which reminds me, another thing the Hunger games does is beat you over the head. My teachers would often as the class to look for the hidden meanings in the book, but next to everything is explicitly spelled out for the viewer. The sublest stuff is things like the nation in he story being called Panem, which is Latin for bread.
GEE I WONDER WHAT THAT COULD MEAN IN A BOOK CALLED THE HUNGER GAMES

You're definitely right about the bland characters, btw, the first thing that struck me is that it's designed to be a teenage power fantasy. That's why the games use kids. It makes no sense, but it means that a kid can insert themselves into this situation. They can be a rebel, they can have a love triangle. They have the power.
I've never read books with self insertion, I always keep a distance from the characters in a story. I want a book to tell me a tale, if I want a story of my own I'll make it up myself, y'know?

 

all i know is i can't stand seeing josh hutcherson's ugly head anymore so real ****ing great job with the casting in those ****ing movies

 

Yeah, and again that's pretty typical of YA novels. The symbolism within doesn't tend to be subtle. That's an accessibility thing, though. It's like books with training wheels, in a way? Again, not to degrade YA literature or claim superiority over it, but I do find it's usually true. It challenges the reader in some ways (like naming something Panem is fairly obvious for bread, as you mention, but it teaches the reader that there's significance in names, that writers do everything intentionally, and that they have to do some legwork when something seems significant).

Which YAs want! Puberty and middle school suck ass, most of the time, so they crave an escapism. YA novels offer that, hell all novels offer that, but YA novels do it in a way that's designed to appeal to them. That's why I like the idea of the Hunger Games (despite having not read them lol point of thread) because they do offer that escapism, self-insert, fantasy, in a way that at least slightly challenges the reader (we have to, also, appreciate that not all Hunger Games readers are at your reading level) and gets the reader to relate the novel's dystopia to their own society (thus presenting one of the driving forces behind literature, the social criticism).

kid has got hella bone structure

 

I don't have any meaningful input as I'm not a fan of the series, but as for the movie soundtrack: Elastic Heart, Mirror & Angel on Fire >>> ;-;

 

I downloaded for Gale Song & Silhouettes, but I also really like Devil May Cry, Who We Are, Everybody Wants to Rule the World, Mirror, and Angel on Fire. FUN FACTS THOUGH, ANGEL ON FIRE is Antony Hegarty, who has been in SOME OF MY FAVE COCOROSIE SONGS ( tearz for animals ).

 

Yass Misty! You have great taste. I love Antony & the Johnsons and CocoRosie. I was bopping to Noah's Ark the other day and his voice on Beautiful Boyz ugh.

/derailT

 

IMO the third book sucks, but the first two are great.

 

CocoRosie are amazing, I listen to them quite often! Beautiful Boyz is really good but my love for South 2nd, Honey or Tar, and Noah's Ark itself kind of eclipse it for me on that particular album. Tearz tho

tearz