first, let me say, you shouldn’t read this post if:
- you loved loved loved “catching fire.”
- you haven’t read “catching fire” but you want to.
- you like eating pickled herring.
- you can’t stand my book snobbery.
so. i finished “catching fire” last night. and i hated it. i really really hated it. i almost just quit reading it, but my neighbors were having an exceptionally loud block party with an exceptionally loud [drunken] guitarist and i couldn’t sleep and the only book on my nightstand was “catching fire.”
let me tell you why i hated it. first up, katniss. i hate her. i felt like her naivete and boorishness and just plain idiocy was somewhat excusable in the first book, but here in the second i wasn’t buying her bizarre sort of innocence for a second. you can’t tell me that someone who survived the hunger games, even if she is only seventeen, would be that far removed from reality. i mean, the girl did not notice anything going on around her. and for a skilled hunter, that just seems odd at best and poorly conceived at worst. this all [might] be excusable if her character was somewhat likeable. but [and i'm shielding my head from arrows as i type] i like katniss about as much as i like bella swan. yeah. that’s not much. get those two together for tea and crumpets and everyone would drown in boredom.
second, i was annoyed [angry?] that all the characters registered so flat in this second installment. if you ask me, collins got lazy and expected all the character development from the first novel to carry through to the second. not so. if anything, what little reality and substance katniss and peeta had in the first book is lost in the second. i have trouble deciding if i care about either one of them.
third, did anyone else feel like they were reading a really disturbing and grotesque version of “the truman show”?
fourth, why, oh why, did this book have to be so much like the first? why did i have to read about another killing spree in the arena? why? why? why?
sigh. diatribe over. if you loved it, go ahead. tell me why.
[ps - yes. i am going to have to read the sequel. the last line was enough to make me wonder if something interesting, new, and intriguing could happen in the third book.]
THANK YOU!!
I don’t think I hated the book as much as you did. I thought it was at least entertaining.
But you are the ONLY other person I know who was thoroughly annoyed by Katniss. I mean, REALLY. She can interpret all sorts of messages from her sponsor and hunt incredibly well, but she doesn’t realize the feelings that these guys have for her and she doesn’t even know her own feelings? Really? She really has no idea about the massive underground that is going on in high places with all those mockingjays around her? For real? She can’t figure out that she is part of a rebellion? She’s just going along with the game?
I have a hard time liking partially stupid main characters. I feel like her character is inconsistent and unbelievable.
Glad I have at least one friend who didn’t like her either. Makes me feel better.
Thanks for making me laugh. I think I just don’t read as much into a book as you do. I liked it. I, too, was annoyed at Katniss, but I guess I just thought it was the book. Maybe I should have higher expectations from authors
But this way I most of the time enjoy a book 
I agree with Rebecca. I liked it enough to be entertained. I do totally see the coraltion between Kat and Bella. Two stupid girls with no hope of making it through life with any stitch of dignity left. I am very excited about #3, and hope that they won’t somehow end up in a Truman-esk world again (I saw the Truman show a couple of days ago. Thats a good movie. I love the music in it). (Have you ever read Girl with a Pearl Earring? I would love to hear your take on it.)