It's 8:36pm. We haven't seen our waitress in over 40 minutes. What is she trying to tell us? We've displeased her somehow, and the wait is our punishment. I look across the table at my girlfriends, Steph and Addison. None of us is going to last much longer, so I take the risk. I dart to the next table, and even with a bad case of "Kindle thumb", am able to latch my chopsticks onto two strips of sesame chicken that the departed party left behind. I hurry it back and fling it onto a napkin. It's mostly gristle. And cold. But it'll sustain us. "Want some?" I ask, but my girlfriends just stare. It's just as well that we're not amiable. We know what this will come to, we're all thinking it. Even now, waiting for a meal we will all share, I'm thinking of just how I might do it. Steph will be easy enough. She's close to the bannister, and already so fatigued. I could flip her over, just like that. Easy. It's Addison who will be trouble. She's small, but precise. I've seen her play bocce ball. But I'm good with a chopstick. So long as she's in range, I'm positive I can jab it at just the right angle and . . . oh god! What kind of monster has this game made of me? Hana Sushi, what has your cruel reign done to us all?
Okay, first of all: I loved The Hunger Games. I give it four stars. I pulled the sample up on my brand spankin' new Kindle, got to the end, and was totally sold. Couldn't put it down. Protagonist Katniss Everdeen is fantastically developed and her intent on survival is
real stuff. The pomp and circumstance surrounding the Games was fun (thought I found the need for stylists a little odd), as well as the denizens of District 12 and their black market methods of community sustainability. Surprises! Twists and turns! Feigned alliances! I loved the story and I will read the rest of them and love them, too, I'm sure. That said, I hit some
major, teeth-grinding peeves that I must share. Here they are. Please validate me.
Peeta, the male lead, is flatter than Michael Phelps's abs (
damn, son!). I couldn't get a feel for his personality at all, if there happened to be one. Maybe because his name is
Peeta, and every time he is mentioned, all I could think of was Lois from
Family Guy saying "Peeetaaaaaaaah." And pitas. And peat moss. All at once.
Sleep Talk. The footage of Peeta uttering Katniss's name in his fevered sleep. Overdone. Makes me want to die. Made me want to die when Ron Weasley did it. This shit
never happens in real life. The last thing I said in my sleep to a lover was so weird and embarrassing that my face caught fire. It was not his name.
Clover taunting Katniss with a knife. Honey, this is the Hunger Games. Just stab the bitch.
Rue's Death scene. I'll just say it: Corny.
Special abilities! This is a character crutch that drives me crazy. Stephanie Meyers did this to death. (Edward can read minds! Alice can see the future! Zafrina can make you hallucinate that you're in a jungle but only if she's within 30 feet of you and there are no werewolves around to block her senses!) Ahem. Peeta is a baker's son. He's iced a ton of cakes, so obviously, he must be very good at painting himself with camouflage. I don't call that a special ability. I call that a big fucking stretch. Luckily, none of the other Tributes had such singular skills. Except for the cunning Foxface, who was alright. Foxface, you should have won. Or escaped. I want to see you again.
Surprise! Mutant dog pack! Mrs. Collins! What the
hell was that?
Romance trumps Rebellion: I know this series bends toward revolution, but I see none of that in this book. We know that Katniss blames the Capitol for her poverty, that she fears what the Capitol can do to her and her family. But we never get to see her resentment go any further. She doesn't ponder what a rebellion would be like, or dream of what life could be like after. The closest thing we see to defiance is the Peeta/Katniss double suicide threat, and (apparently?) the decoration of Rue's body, which I just didn't get. Placing flowers on a poor dead child hardly feels all that defiant to me. Instead of defiance, we get to see Katniss preoccupy herself with pretending a romance with Peeta in order to get more sponsors. This felt predictable, boring, and beside the point. Why is Katniss lending so much thought to a boy who's about as interesting as the mud he hides under when she should be stewing with serious revolutionary rage?
So there you have it. My biggest criticism of The Hunger Games, I suppose, is actually a compliment: I wish there was more of it. I like a fast read, but I feel like this story has the potential to be three times longer, piled with cultural detail and political savagery, a real sci-fi classic. But then I remember that it's YA, and I need not be so hard on it. I may want it to be a generation-defining novel, but what I really wanted when I bought it was a good story. And The Hunger Games delivered!
PS!
Only 25 copies of the first run of
Vessel left!
ReadVessel.com. Get it, read it, and then tear me apart like a pack of wild dog whose eyes are genetic replicas of those I have killed...
.
