The Hunger Games

When I think of writing the summary of the book we've just read I try to avoid writing a 'book report' like you would in school. Instead, I think of the times at book club when one of us hasn't finished the book and how we all jump in trying to fill in what that person missed. The conversation doesn't always flow chronologically, we sometimes miss something that maybe wasn't too important anyway, and we share our favourite parts and even sometimes quotes. This is how I approach our summaries here. So while there are many spots to find condensed, concise, 'proper' summaries of the books we read out in the internet, this is not one of those places. Instead things are a little jumbled, more conversational, and hopefully ring true to our book club - enthusiastic and informative but not an English class study. So, here's how I imagine we'd share what happened in The Hunger Games if one of us had not had a chance to finish it.

original photo from here

The Hunger Games and The Most Dangerous Game

For the month of March we are reading The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins.* The buzz around this story has grown immensely over the last half year - especially now with the first movie in the trilogy coming out later this month - but it wasn't until recently that I really grew interested in reading these novels. I think my first exposure to them was when I was browsing around Indigo looking for books for the book club to give to Karyn on her arrival home from Rwanda and to celebrate her engagement. I was pretty pregnant at the time, and if you've ever been pregnant you might know this, everyone wants to help you and talk with you. So, while I was browsing in Indigo a number of sales associates offered to help me. I heard about a lot of good books that night but one lady in particular took me on a grand tour of the store showing me many different novels. She brought me over to the pre-teen section, pointed to The Hunger Games trilogy and told me, "now these might be for kids, but seriously, you have got to read them. They're a great read." Although not what I was looking for that night, I tucked that bit of information in my head as something to look into later. I'm so glad that Carolyn chose The Hunger Games to read this month and now I finally have the chance to read them.
Not knowing anything about The Hunger Games story line I was reminded, based on the title alone, of a hallowe'en episode of The Simpsons where Mr. Burns puts a number of the townspeople in a forest and hunts them for sport (starts at 9:45). That episode is based on the short story "The Most Dangerous Game" by Richard Connell which he wrote in 1924. I won't give away the ending, it is worth reading, but it involves man hunting man.

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