I sure do like Suzanne Collins' reality TV stars better than our lot - but that's the only thing about her world that I can say such a thing about. And what they have to endure to become what they are is quite terrifying.
This third volume of The Hunger Games brings all of the allegory home: the pampered, opulent Capitol as a first world civilization dependent on its subjugated colony/districts for sustenance and entertainment; the Games as war, in which children are forced to fight out their parents' conflicts. Which is to say it's all pretty ugly, and pretty familiar, right down to the transformation of Katniss Everdeen into a fiery rebel leader - but only for the cameras.
This is a cynical book on a macro level but still a complex and rewarding one. The comparison I made to Orson Scott Card's best work still holds, though in this volume I thought of Songbird's Ansett more than of Ender or Bean as several of Collins' characters share bits of the former's harrowing experience.
And I, for one, am exhausted from sharing it all with them.
This third volume of The Hunger Games brings all of the allegory home: the pampered, opulent Capitol as a first world civilization dependent on its subjugated colony/districts for sustenance and entertainment; the Games as war, in which children are forced to fight out their parents' conflicts. Which is to say it's all pretty ugly, and pretty familiar, right down to the transformation of Katniss Everdeen into a fiery rebel leader - but only for the cameras.
This is a cynical book on a macro level but still a complex and rewarding one. The comparison I made to Orson Scott Card's best work still holds, though in this volume I thought of Songbird's Ansett more than of Ender or Bean as several of Collins' characters share bits of the former's harrowing experience.
And I, for one, am exhausted from sharing it all with them.
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