All I can say to that is - now I'm hungry.
Suzanne Collins's trilogy The Hunger Games
, Catching Fire (The Second Book of the Hunger Games), and Mockingjay (The Hunger Games, Book 3)
was the most exciting book series I have read in the last five years.It was strange how it all began. My cousin's wife came back from a teacher's conference for reading asking me, "Everyone keeps talking about 'The Hunger Games', have you heard of it?" I had, but neither then, nor now could I place where. It was just in passing. However, this was now the second time it had come up and I try not to ignore such book recommendations. Unfortunately, at the time, I was having my own personal issues with reading, surviving and just staying pain-free in and between my teaching schedule. I didn't have the time, nor the stamina to consider reading for pleasure.
Then, in June 2009 I was hospitalized, diagnosed and sent home with treatment unable to drive, read the printed word, computer screens or even watch television. My vision was terrible and trying to see things lead me to a world of pain. I rose each morning, ate breakfast, took my meds, and laid on the couch with my beagle until my husband got home. I was losing my mind.
One day, while feeling all too sorry for myself and longing for stories, I despaired in my mind and remembered: audiobooks! I grabbed my iPhone, closed one eye, squinted the other and started to think. Then I remembered. I wanted to read The Hunger Games! It was downloaded and after hours of clambering around the house on a quest for my headphones, I had a new friend on my couch of isolation.
I was finally taken away from my own solitude and immersed in Collins's fantastic tale. In the days that I listened, that I "read" the only way I could, I was inspired to fight again. I, perhaps, did not have quite the same dystopian environment surrounding me that my beautiful Katniss did, but I had my own. I had my upside down world of blindness, sickness, motherlessness, mourning, pain and confusion. I did not have to battle others thrown into an unwated battle with me, I had to battle a disease with an unknown origins, unknown triggers and merciless timing. I did not have to conquer Capitol, I had to conquer my own Pride. It did not take me three books to wage a war and understand my positions of power and powerlessness, I imagine it will take me a lifetime...
But The Hunger Games woke me up. The Hunger Games brought my soul back by injecting me with a rich tale of one girl who wouldn't quit, one girl who fought for what was important to her, one girl who loved her family so deeply.
I have long been nervous about the release of The Hunger Games films. This trailer sets my mind at ease. It looks right, but what's more important - it feels right. I'll see you guys at the theaters on March 23, 2012 (Oh... if there's a midnight showing - that's the one I'll be at!)
Have you read The Hunger Games?
If so, what was your experience like?
If not, are you waiting for the movie, or have you not heard of it before?
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