Mockingjay

What a disappointment, among my complaints:
- This is the first book I have read in which the poor grammar has snapped me out of my reading. It's unbelievable how many times this happened. Some parts of it are the writing style, but other parts are just pure grammatical errors.
- I came to dislike the protagonist, unable to emphasise.
- The story churned into a dull love-triangle.

This book deserves high praise just for how novel it is - I have never seen an ostensibly young adult book explore such abstract concepts, such as the sacrifices that the “good guys” make for victory. I found the role that Katniss was cast in and the tension between the role she had to perform and her own goals and personality particularly compelling. The use of media and “spin” by both sides was done in a very subtle, well-handled way.

I continue to object to Collins' writing style - her word choice and her decision to very explicitly explain concepts as she goes along both play to a much more juvenile audience than the audience who would be able to appreciate the concepts in the Hunger Games anyway, so I am not sure why that choice was made.

Huh. I don't really know where to start.

The truth is that while reading this, I wasn't even sure where Catching Fire ended and Mockingjay began. Since I picked this up right after finishing Catching Fire, they blended together into one long, kind of surreal experience. Of course, Catching Fire ended with Gale saying “There is no District 12.” But my consciousness of everything that went on in the second arena just melded right into our time in District 13. Needless to say, this has been one exhausting, traumatizing, whiplash-inducing ride for everyone involved.

After finishing, I'd say I felt...disheartened? I had, and still have, an empty kind of feeling. Katniss was torn apart again and again, forced to endure yet another trauma, never able to escape the fear and nightmares whether awake or asleep. I haven't read that much YA, but what I have read of YA adventure-type novels (particularly fantasy), there isn't much exploration of the everyday, lived experience of trauma, PTSD, or even physical injury. The characters may go through extreme situations as Katniss has, but Mockingjay is the first YA I've read that really makes this pain a significant part of the book which fundamentally impacts the main character's sense of self. Bearing witness to this makes me ache for Katniss and everyone else; it makes the book heavy in my hands; it makes it unforgettable. Katniss feels so real to me and so intimate to my soul right now, that I almost feel cheated out of seeing the rest of her life. But I can rest knowing that she and Peeta made it, and they are creating a sort of happiness (except where is Gale, I wonder?).

At some points, especially in the first half, I wasn't convinced that the plot made total sense...or that this is even how rebellions work. But I was eventually convinced, or at least cared enough about the characters to believe in the plot. Ah, this painful plot. Every time I thought I had this book figured out, every time I thought I knew where we were going and had finally escaped the worst of it, Mockingjay gave me a jolt and suddenly we were on a different, still more tragic path. I don't mean that I didn't guess what some of the plot twists and reveals would be — but the aftermath of those twists yanked me through a plot which, on the whole, affected me more than I anticipated. I saw “hijacked” Peeta coming early on, but that didn't make it any less painful. To have the finale of the trilogy be nearly devoid of genuine, romantic, and certain-minded Peeta is pretty jarring. Similarly, I could sniff hypocrisy in 13's motives from a distance — but that didn't make my jaw drop any less when Katniss shot her assassination arrow at Coin instead of Snow.

Even though I saw these moments coming, what made them so riveting was that I had no idea how we would get out of the mess and terror that the twists created. How will our beloved Katniss/Peeta duo ever be possible again, and how will he ever be the same? What on earth will happen after Katniss kills Coin?

The void of unknown that loomed after these reveals was terrifying. The answer to the first question took basically the whole book to answer, and kept my heart aching until the end. The answer to the second question came quicker, but not after a harrowing chapter of Katniss in solitary confinement. I've been with her in hospital stay after hospital stay, trauma after trauma, hallucination and confusion and morphling and violence and despair... But this late chapter emptied me and terrified me more than any other. Maybe it had to do with the fact that it was late at night...but it was also extremely well written. From the moment the second bomb went off and Katniss watched Prim be set ablaze and killed, Suzanne imbued her words with a sort of desperate poetry that leapt off the page and sunk into my brain. By the time we're in solitary confinement with Katniss, I'm in a near hallucinatory state from her words and the whiplash of Prim's death and Coin's assassination. Here, Katniss has absolutely zero hope for life or future existence — and I am stuck there with her, with no peek of the outside world. I want to weep for her, but I feel frozen and empty at the same time.

And then suddenly we're out. And now we're going “home.” And the book is wrapping up. And things are changing. And there's a future. And this is not what I expected when I picked up The Hunger Games #1. And I think about little past me a few weeks ago, reading about Katniss and Peeta and everyone else for the first time, and how little I knew... How very little I knew then.

I guess the book had to end at some point, and this was probably a good place for it to happen. I don't know why, but each time one of the books in this trilogy ends, something feels off. This one felt like it ended a little too fast. Maybe it's just because my mind is still reeling from everything that just happened, and then suddenly we're done. It's a happy ending, by the time we get to the epilogue, but it's certainly not as shiny as a lot of YA books I've read. Which I appreciate. But it's also hard.

You are strong, Katniss. May you live free and happy.

Yes, please, suck the life out of a decent book series and ramble for close to 400 pages. That's exactly what I want to read in my free time.

There were a few things that resembled what I originally liked about the series. There were some great emotional moments. Haymitch, who is officially my favorite character, was at his acidic yet fatherly best. Other than that, though, there was nothing enjoyable about this book. The sense of urgency and peril from the previous books was gone because the snappy pacing was replaced with aimless mood swings. The short, curt sentences which worked great for a quick moving, straightforward story line, became awkward under the weight of Katniss' angst and the roundabout political machinations of the people around her.

There's no real driving motivation, no focus. The rebellion is something that's separate from Katniss, that she has no control over and questions the morality of, and her personal goal of killing Snow seems distant for the fact that, unlike with Catching Fire, the two of them have no relationship or contact. Not to mention, it becomes clear as the story goes that its not going to happen, and even if it did, thanks to Katniss' refusal to accept her own innate moral ambiguity, it would not be satisfying.

Katniss is a shell of the character she once was. She sees the world for the most part through a fog, and as such, so does the reader. Time and actions pass in paragraphs full of fuzzy descriptions and Katniss' own self hatred. In the last fifty pages or so there were countless moments where I thought, “Ok, you can end it now,” where there might have been something quick and clever about the end of Katniss' bleak and meandering story, but it kept going. And honestly, she should've died after she killed Coin. It would have made her purpose in the story much more clear, and things could've been wrapped up in an epilogue from someone else's point of view, which I was kind of craving the whole time.

All this makes it sound like I care a lot more about how bad this was, but I really don't. That was the big problem, Mockingjay invoked very little emotion or passion or interest. I felt the way Katniss felt through most the story - tired. I could probably write a couple more paragraphs of how the idea of District 13 surviving so long completely independently is kind of ridiculous, and also where the fuck is the rest of the world, in what universe does a civil war break out and other nations don't try to get involved? But it's really not worth the spoons.

Also. I'm getting really bored with this heteronormative, relationship and baby focused story telling, where there is no conclusion unless we know who the main character married, that their legacy or imprint on the world doesn't count unless its in the form of biological offspring. Nevermind the fact that in this case it felt totally slapped on, because it was apparently so important that we know that despite a whole book of barely being able to look at each other, eventually they figured it out and got with the babymaking, even if it means summing it up in one or two paragraphs. Ugh.

So. Yeah. This was extremely disappointing. The main thing that was getting me through was imagining Haymitch played by Jeffrey Dean Morgan (I like Woody Harrelson, don't get me wrong, but what the fuck is with that hair?). On the plus side, this story will probably work a lot better as a movie, unless they decide to include a voice over of Katniss' whining during the battle scenes.

So much of this book is different from the previous two entries that it just felt wrong. And the lead character, for a myriad not-so-believable reasons, has become whiny and introspective. We spend, maybe a solid 50% of the text listening to what's going on inside her head - and none of it is impressive. I found it really, really hard to trudge through this volume - and did so, only for series completion's sake.

The book was everything I expected it to be and more. I picked up the first book 5 days ago and immersed myself in Panem.

I loved all the characters from the start. This is one of the few books where the less important characters...Rue, Prim, Cinna made such a big impression one me.

The only part of the book that left me unhappy is the ending. Somehow I don't buy the happily ever after. It doesn't feel real. Apart from that I think the story was pretty much perfect.

The ending was a little chaotic (and sad), but overall I'm really impressed with this series. Not only was it a wild ride, it also poses ethical questions that are impossible to answer in black and white.

Fascinating.

This is my least favorite of the 3 books, but this series is one of my all-time favorites.

Wow..Wow..Wow...this third installment was awesome! Pulls you in right from the start and never lets you go until you've finished it.
Couldn't keep my eyes dry near the end.

This is a book that stays with you a while after you finish it..at least I have a feeling it does with me.

Will definitely recommend this series to other people who haven't read it yet.