The first book of the trilogy by Suzanne Collins.
Compared to a Heinlein this book was written
for middle school kids...and maybe it was written simply to appeal to
the greatest number of people. I was out of books and heading into a
long and arduous night at
work so I decided to give Collins a try.
When I first started reading the
novel I was almost bored...the story seemed to start like many others
but with a few differences to set Collins apart. The world as we know it
has failed and out of the ashes rose a new empire
with 13 smaller districts...our heroine, Katniss, was
from district 12, one of the poorest districts. She spends her day
breaking the law by foraging and hunting in the forest beyond the gate
with her friend Gale. We get
some background story on the girl, her family and the boy and his
family....nothing interesting happens until the day of the 'reaping'
...which is like a lottery except the person chosen must compete to the
death with the other districts in "The Hunger Games".
The heroine does not get picked however her twelve year old sister does
and Katniss cannot let this happen so she volunteered to take her sisters place.