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A review by coralinejones
The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins
slow-paced
2.75
I'M FREE! WORST EXPERIENCE OF MY LIFE!
But no, seriously, as a huge Hunger Games fan this book was ginormous let down. I knew it would be, and that's why I put off reading it for so long, but given the movie is coming out this year, and that there's a current Hunger Games resurgence happening, I figured I would give in and finally get it over with.
This book is extremely disjointed in my opinion. It starts off slow and tedious, starts to pick up a bit, and then we get overwhelmed with song lyrics and Lucy Gray's odd personality. (Though, finding out backstory for the songs that we heard back in 2012 was cute). We get annoying tidbits about Snow being an opportunistic, jerk off, asshole, and then the games start. It's an interesting read, as the games are, and then it goes back to being really slow. Add an unrealistic, uncomfortable romance, that wasn't selling it, and then it just ends.
There's some really honest moments in there but I realized, early on, that those segments were when I could connect memories and Easter eggs from the original trilogy to this book. I liked finding out very minute details about The Hunger Games, like how the 10th Games really transformed the whole idea of The Hunger Games; how that year they became very raunchy and gory because nobody was watching / wanted to watch. I enjoyed the various opinions about the Games, finding out that there were, in fact, people in and out of the capitol who were against them, and that they knew very well that they probably shouldn't move society in this direction. I think those moments highlighted how horrific the whole idea of The Hunger Games is, and helped make the original trilogy, and what we know about even scarier and upsetting.
A lot of the book is actually a nod towards MockingJay and the events that went down in the last book rather than the first two.
I didn't go into this thinking it would be this action-packed, super tense, scary-horror filled story like the original Hunger Games. I didn't go into this assuming I'd read about rebellions or Snow's hatred for Katniss or how he felt about Peeta or any of that. I knew we wouldn't. I knew this was, in a sense, a villain origin story, and that we would be seeing the Hunger Games from another perspective but... It still fell short. It was boring. I genuinely felt like there wasn't much detail about the actual Hunger Games or why Snow became the person we knew in the 74th Games. There was too much emphasis on Snow and his very odd relationship with Lucy Gray, which I found weird. Yes, to a degree, that is the point, but...
I dislike Lucy Gray as a character. Others described her as Snow's Manic Pixie Dream Victor and I agree 1000%. They're trying to market Lucy Gray, in promotion for this movie, as similar to Katniss? People saying Snow hated Katniss so much because she reminded him of her and like... Sure? Off the small basis of the very, very end when he came in contact with the Katniss plant when Lucy betrayed him? Is that really enough to sell what he did to her? Does it really explain how he turned into the soulless, evil, tyrant we know?
I think at the end of the day, this book didn't need to be written. It's well-written. Suzanne Collins' brain is still amazing and I wish I could pick it apart and know everything there is to know about The Hunger Games from her perspective, but this is a story that didn't need to be told. Her original work was so well-written that, not knowing about Snow's previous backstory, was okay because how the Games was presented sold us instantly.
I think if you never read this, you wouldn't miss out on anything.
But no, seriously, as a huge Hunger Games fan this book was ginormous let down. I knew it would be, and that's why I put off reading it for so long, but given the movie is coming out this year, and that there's a current Hunger Games resurgence happening, I figured I would give in and finally get it over with.
This book is extremely disjointed in my opinion. It starts off slow and tedious, starts to pick up a bit, and then we get overwhelmed with song lyrics and Lucy Gray's odd personality. (Though, finding out backstory for the songs that we heard back in 2012 was cute). We get annoying tidbits about Snow being an opportunistic, jerk off, asshole, and then the games start. It's an interesting read, as the games are, and then it goes back to being really slow. Add an unrealistic, uncomfortable romance, that wasn't selling it, and then it just ends.
There's some really honest moments in there but I realized, early on, that those segments were when I could connect memories and Easter eggs from the original trilogy to this book. I liked finding out very minute details about The Hunger Games, like how the 10th Games really transformed the whole idea of The Hunger Games; how that year they became very raunchy and gory because nobody was watching / wanted to watch. I enjoyed the various opinions about the Games, finding out that there were, in fact, people in and out of the capitol who were against them, and that they knew very well that they probably shouldn't move society in this direction. I think those moments highlighted how horrific the whole idea of The Hunger Games is, and helped make the original trilogy, and what we know about even scarier and upsetting.
A lot of the book is actually a nod towards MockingJay and the events that went down in the last book rather than the first two.
I didn't go into this thinking it would be this action-packed, super tense, scary-horror filled story like the original Hunger Games. I didn't go into this assuming I'd read about rebellions or Snow's hatred for Katniss or how he felt about Peeta or any of that. I knew we wouldn't. I knew this was, in a sense, a villain origin story, and that we would be seeing the Hunger Games from another perspective but... It still fell short. It was boring. I genuinely felt like there wasn't much detail about the actual Hunger Games or why Snow became the person we knew in the 74th Games. There was too much emphasis on Snow and his very odd relationship with Lucy Gray, which I found weird. Yes, to a degree, that is the point, but...
I dislike Lucy Gray as a character. Others described her as Snow's Manic Pixie Dream Victor and I agree 1000%. They're trying to market Lucy Gray, in promotion for this movie, as similar to Katniss? People saying Snow hated Katniss so much because she reminded him of her and like... Sure? Off the small basis of the very, very end when he
I think at the end of the day, this book didn't need to be written. It's well-written. Suzanne Collins' brain is still amazing and I wish I could pick it apart and know everything there is to know about The Hunger Games from her perspective, but this is a story that didn't need to be told. Her original work was so well-written that, not knowing about Snow's previous backstory, was okay because how the Games was presented sold us instantly.
I think if you never read this, you wouldn't miss out on anything.