#1: The Last Summer of the Death Warriors by Francisco X. Stork: 2 stars.
#2: The Name of This Book is a Secret by Pseudonymous Bosch: 2 stars.
#3: The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins: 2 stars.
#4: Different Seasons by Stephen King: 2 stars.
#5: The Miserable Mill by Lemony Snicket: 2 stars.
#6: The Austere Academy by Lemony Snicket: 1 star.
#7: The Ersatz Elevator by Lemony Snicket: 1 star.
#8: Paper Towns by John Green: 2 stars.
#9: If You’re Reading This, It’s Too Late by Pseudonymous Bosch: 3 stars.
#10: *Looking for Alaska by John Green: 1 star.
#11: The Complete Peanuts, Vol. 2 by Charles M. Schulz: 5 stars.
#12: And Another Thing… by Eion Colfer: 2 stars.
#13: The Diving Bell and the Butterfly by Jean-Dominique Bauby: 4 stars.
*Warning: spoils a pivotal plot-point.
Why did you prefer the first Hunger Games movie to the second? I’d read the books first and I felt the reverse of how you did, so I’m curious about your perspective. I think one thing the first movie didn’t do as well as the book is build up the relationship between Katniss and Rue so a moment that was very emotional for me in the novel wasn’t nearly as strong in the film.
I’d say welcome back but the fact that you stated that you are 52 reviews behind in your first review isn’t exactly news I wanted to hear. I was expecting you to be somewhere around 20, not 52 :p
It mostly has to do with detesting the love-triangle crap that comes out in full force in the second book/movie. And Katniss, not the most interesting character to begin with, grates on me even more in the second book/movie. Her attention is all on getting Peeta out of the Quarter Quell alive, this guy I still don’t believe she cares for one bit, not even in the sense that she’s indebted to him, and not at all on herself. I feel like she’d just as soon die if it’d stop the uprisings and let Peeta live a long and healthy, though probably unhappy, life. People treat her as a symbol of defiance, and she does nothing to deserve anyone, Peeta, Gale, or anyone else, caring about her. That came off as angrier than I meant it to…
Yeah, I went a little overboard, didn’t I? I guess I just went all in this year to win CBR6. I was reading at a more normal rate, but others on here were keeping pace with me, and I hadn’t even stopped to write a review yet, and so I started reading at a rather frantic pace.
I think the whole love triangle thing was played up for the YA audience since it seems like every YA book has to have one, whether it adds to the story or not. fainting violet had an interesting take on it in her Catching Fire review. http://cannonballread5.wordpress.com/2013/12/06/faintingviolets-cbr5-review-28-catching-fire-by-suzanne-collins/
One thing I liked about the movie is that I felt like it really showed that Katniss was traumatized by the events. I think a lot of the complaints with the third book (and I admit, I occasionally wondered what had happened to Katniss at first as well) were due to the fact that people didn’t quite get the PTSD she was suffering from, so this movie made sure to already show it for later.
Thanks for the hat tip. The Love Triangle business was a hotly debated plot point among some friends of mine, so my review basically devolved into a rant about it. :)
I think the reason I might be having a tough time digging into Book Three is that with Katniss so deeply into the PTSD its a tough read for me. I continue to wish this series had been written from Peeta’s POV, of that Collins had switched POVs between books. (Book 1 – Katniss, Book 2 – Peeta, Book 3 – Gale?)
Yes to switching the POV. 100% yes.
And though I agree to an extent with your assessment of her love for Gale being more familial, I just have yet to see any sign that she cares for Peeta outside of doing so because she’s indebted to him. So I’d also agree that there’s not really a true love-triangle if you think about it, yet the books still try and make it seem like there is, I’d say.