Mockingjay (The Hunger Games, Book 3) [Hardcover]

Auther : Suzanne Collins
Publisher : Scholastic Press
ISBN : 0439023513
ISBN13 : 9780439023511
Pages : 400
List Price : $17.99 $8.36
Book Rating :

Book Description

Against all odds, Katniss Everdeen has survived the Hunger Games twice. But now that she's made it out of the bloody arena alive, she's still not safe. The Capitol is angry. The Capitol wants revenge. Who do they think should pay for the unrest? Katniss. And what's worse, President Snow has made it clear that no one else is safe either. Not Katniss's family, not her friends, not the people of District 12. Powerful and haunting, this thrilling final installment of Suzanne Collins's groundbreaking The Hunger Games trilogy promises to be one of the most talked about books of the year.

A Q&A with Suzanne Collins, Author of Mockingjay (The Final Book of The Hunger Games)

Q: You have said from the start that The Hunger Games story was intended as a trilogy. Did it actually end the way you planned it from the beginning?

A: Very much so. While I didn't know every detail, of course, the arc of the story from gladiator game, to revolution, to war, to the eventual outcome remained constant throughout the writing process.

Q: We understand you worked on the initial screenplay for a film to be based on The Hunger Games. What is the biggest difference between writing a novel and writing a screenplay?

A: There were several significant differences. Time, for starters. When you're adapting a novel into a two-hour movie you can't take everything with you. The story has to be condensed to fit the new form. Then there's the question of how best to take a book told in the first person and present tense and transform it into a satisfying dramatic experience. In the novel, you never leave Katniss for a second and are privy to all of her thoughts so you need a way to dramatize her inner world and to make it possible for other characters to exist outside of her company. Finally, there's the challenge of how to present the violence while still maintaining a PG-13 rating so that your core audience can view it. A lot of things are acceptable on a page that wouldn't be on a screen. But how certain moments are depicted will ultimately be in the director's hands.

Q: Are you able to consider future projects while working on The Hunger Games, or are you immersed in the world you are currently creating so fully that it is too difficult to think about new ideas?

A: I have a few seeds of ideas floating around in my head but--given that much of my focus is still on The Hunger Games--it will probably be awhile before one fully emerges and I can begin to develop it.

Q: The Hunger Games is an annual televised event in which one boy and one girl from each of the twelve districts is forced to participate in a fight-to-the-death on live TV. What do you think the appeal of reality television is--to both kids and adults?

A: Well, they're often set up as games and, like sporting events, there's an interest in seeing who wins. The contestants are usually unknown, which makes them relatable. Sometimes they have very talented people performing. Then there's the voyeuristic thrill—watching people being humiliated, or brought to tears, or suffering physically--which I find very disturbing. There's also the potential for desensitizing the audience, so that when they see real tragedy playing out on, say, the news, it doesn't have the impact it should.

Q: If you were forced to compete in the Hunger Games, what do you think your special skill would be?

A: Hiding. I'd be scaling those trees like Katniss and Rue. Since I was trained in sword-fighting, I guess my best hope would be to get hold of a rapier if there was one available. But the truth is I'd probably get about a four in Training.

Q: What do you hope readers will come away with when they read The Hunger Games trilogy?

A: Questions about how elements of the books might be relevant in their own lives. And, if they're disturbing, what they might do about them.

Q: What were some of your favorite novels when you were a teen?

A: A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers
Nineteen Eighty Four by George Orwell
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
Boris by Jaapter Haar
Germinal by Emile Zola
Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury

(Photo © Cap Pryor)

Mockingjay (The Hunger Games, Book 3) Reviews

1,329 of 1,461 people found the following review helpful:

Unexpected Direction, but Perfection, August 24, 2010

A. R. Bovey - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Mockingjay (The Hunger Games, Book 3) (Hardcover)

This was a brilliant conclusion to the trilogy. I can only compare it to "Ender's Game" - and that is extremely high praise, indeed.

When I first closed the book last night, I felt shattered, empty, and drained.

And that was the point, I think. I'm glad I waited to review the book because I'm not sure what my review would have been.

For the first two books, I think most of us readers have all been laboring under the assumption that Katniss Everdeen would eventually choose one of the two terrific men in her life: Gale, her childhood companion or Peeta, the one who accompanied her to the Hunger Games twice. She'd pick one of them and live happily ever after with him, surrounded by friends and family. Somehow, along the way, Katniss would get rid of the awful President Snow and stop the evil Hunger Games. How one teenage girl would do all that, we weren't too sure, but we all had faith and hope that she would.

"Mockingjay"... Read more

38 of 40 people found the following review helpful:

Disappointed, October 9, 2010

Cristina (Rio de Janeiro, RJ Brazil) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Mockingjay (The Hunger Games, Book 3) (Hardcover)

I absolutely love the first books and I was totally certain the third would be just as great but I have to say it was overall really disappointing. The worst part for me was the lack of character development, I was expecting anything tragic to happen to any character including Katniss but I never thought she would completely ignore their relationships which were the foundation of the first books. Maybe success ruined it for the author, she started believing she had to write "Literature", send a big message and somehow forgot to be loyal to her story.

SPOILERS AHEAD!

I guess my major complaints are: Katniss's mother is never "real" to me, there is not a single scene in this book that makes her alive, differently from CF and in the end she just disappears, doesn't even visit Katniss in recovery. Finninck's death was so gratuitous, they seemed to have time to escape those mutts and he was an excellent survivor, didn't seem realistic to me. The capitol city is... Read more

177 of 206 people found the following review helpful:

The detractors of this book wanted a fairytale, September 13, 2010

DAVID OTOOLE (Chicago) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Mockingjay (The Hunger Games, Book 3) (Hardcover)

To start I am a 47 year old Veteran.
I have read a lot of the bad reviews for this last book and I see a theme running through them all. They didn't get their fairytale ending and the people they liked didn't end up the way they wanted. Well If you are looking for a fairytale read Harry Potter. If you want a realistic book on how war really is and how people will sacrifice themselves to save their country, then this is for you.
The love triangle between the three main characters resolves itself in the best way that I could see possible. The way each one would react to the horrors of war were obvious from book one. I don't want to include spoilers so Ill just say, read this with an expectation of a realistic portrayal of the characters and how the war would change them. The ending on a personal level, is not necessarily a happy one, but it is a realistic one. From a "Big Picture" perspective I think it was a happy ending. To expect that all of the main characters could... Read more

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