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A review by meoreyn
The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins
informative
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Was this book a bit fanservice-y? Yes, it was. But I want to say, it was an amazing read.
I haven't read or really thought about the original trilogy in a very long time, but with the movie coming out I decided it's time to bite the bullet and read this one. And I am so sorry that I haven't done it earlier. There is something so freeing about reading about a villain. I know how he will turn out, in the end. I hold no sympathy for him. And I didn't come into this expecting redemptions. Sometimes, you just need to read about a bad person, root for them and still hate him in the end.
That being said, there were some truly good, on a moral scale, characters too. Sejanus was so interesting, the war inside of him about being capitol or district and how it shouldn't matter so much, an interesting foil for Coriolanus. Also,his betrayal with the jabberjays and his subsequent death were two of my favorite scenes. But I think, in the end, he had the same problem as the tributes in the hunger games. He was just a kid. It's nigh impossible to make good choices about your own life at that age, inside or outside of the arena, but that is something you can only notice with age.
Lucy Gray, while a bit manic pixie dream girly in the beginning, grew on me a lot. She was strong, resilient, and still kind and optimistic. And the fact that in the end shetook a look at Coriolanus and went "I can make him better? Hell no, imma see myself out!" like you got to respect that. I know this is not a new take, I also read it somewhere else, but truly Katniss was a fighter forced to perform, while Lucy Gray was a performer forced to fight. While I don't love that for her well-being, I am so glad that we are at a point in our society when a female main character can find strength in clothes, and in her community and be feminine and still be considered strong. And if you ask me about the ending, I think she survived .
I could write for a long while about Tigris, about the compact and the compass, about how cool it is that Coriolanus and Dr. Gaul were named after a mother-son duo from a Shakespeare play, but I don't think there is any more that I can say that will make people pick up this book if they didn't want to already. So read it, think about the nature vs nurture debate and whether men are intrinsically good or bad, and then come back and tell me I was right. This is a good book, future fascist dictator or not.
I haven't read or really thought about the original trilogy in a very long time, but with the movie coming out I decided it's time to bite the bullet and read this one. And I am so sorry that I haven't done it earlier. There is something so freeing about reading about a villain. I know how he will turn out, in the end. I hold no sympathy for him. And I didn't come into this expecting redemptions. Sometimes, you just need to read about a bad person, root for them and still hate him in the end.
That being said, there were some truly good, on a moral scale, characters too. Sejanus was so interesting, the war inside of him about being capitol or district and how it shouldn't matter so much, an interesting foil for Coriolanus. Also,
Lucy Gray, while a bit manic pixie dream girly in the beginning, grew on me a lot. She was strong, resilient, and still kind and optimistic. And the fact that in the end she
I could write for a long while about Tigris, about the compact and the compass, about how cool it is that Coriolanus and Dr. Gaul were named after a mother-son duo from a Shakespeare play, but I don't think there is any more that I can say that will make people pick up this book if they didn't want to already. So read it, think about the nature vs nurture debate and whether men are intrinsically good or bad, and then come back and tell me I was right. This is a good book, future fascist dictator or not.
If the cause wasn’t honorable, how could it be an honor to participate in it?