Catching Fire and Mockingjay

     I finished reading Catching Fire, the second book in The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins, a while ago, but I was too busy to write a review until recently.  As I just finished reading the last book, Mockingjay, I decided to do two reviews in one, for a number of reasons.  To be frank, one of those reasons was that I wasn't really willing to write a whole review for either book, especially Mockingjay.

     I began reading Catching Fire eagerly, since I had really enjoyed The Hunger Games.  But my enthusiasm swiftly began to ebb.  The Hunger Games had had a good plot.  Sure, it wasn't Tolkien, but the story seemed to be carefully thought out and written.  Catching Fire, on the other hand, was, well . . . not the same.  It just seemed like an assortment of ideas thrown together and somehow tied into a story.  Maybe that's not entirely fair - once the story finally got going, it was pretty good.  But Collins took far too long, I think, to set the stage.  The book didn't really get exciting until halfway through.

     Other things in Catching Fire bugged me, too.  These were mostly annoying writing details; for example, there are two characters who seem to be awkwardly crammed into the story for almost no reason at all.  In my opinion, Collins should have just written them out - it would have been pretty easy to do.  I wasn't too keen on the whole "love triangle" thing, either (for those of you who have only read The Hunger Games - you knew it was bound to happen.  Peeta.  Gale.  Oh, which will Katniss choose?  *rolls eyes*).  It gets a bit old after the first two or three chapters.

     And then Mockingjay.  Let me start by saying that I really enjoyed the epilogue.  It was a sweet and somewhat satisfying ending to the series.  But I really wish that the rest of the book had been as good.

     Okay, the epilogue wasn't the only good part of Mockingjay - as I read the beginning, I had hopes that Catching Fire was just an awkward transition.  Sadly, it wasn't.  The writing, again, wasn't nearly as good as the first book, and the plot was not too great either, and I didn't like any of the main characters any more. They had all changed too much, and I couldn't relate to any of them.  Another downer was that Suzanne Collins kept on killing off characters.  Lots of characters.  Including the ones who were still likeable.  I won't spoil anything, but I will say that it's a good idea not to get very attached to any of the characters.

     In conclusion, I wan't impressed by the last two books in The Hunger Games trilogy.  I don't think I'll read them again, and I wouldn't really recommend them to anyone.  If you really want to find out how the story ends, then go ahead and read them, but I wouldn't buy them - just borrow the books from the library.  And if you're really busy and don't want to read any books that won't be really enjoyable and worth your while - Cliff's Notes, anyone?