The Hunger Games

by Daisy

 

When you first heard about The Hunger Games, what did you think? If you’re like me you probably just drew a blank, and massive confusion went through your head. The Hunger Games is actually a book series written by Suzanne Collins. The series became quite popular with young adults when it was first published on September 14, 2008. Following suit, Catching Fire, the second of the trilogy, was published just short of a year later on September 1, 2009, and Collins finished strong just eleven months after that with Mockingjay on August 24, 2010.

 

Katniss Everdeen was just your average teenager. She had a little sister, Prim, a loving mother, and a best friend named Gale. What’s not so average about her? She lives in a run-down town fighting to stay alive, not just for herself, but for her family as well. She lives in District 12, which is dirt poor, and everyone is weak and hungry. President Snow runs the districts and the Capitol, which is where the elite live.

 

Every year each district must send out two tributes, one male and one female, for the Hunger Games. These tributes are twelve to eighteen years old, and they must travel to the Capitol to participate in this annual event, where they must brutally kill each other on live broadcast for the rest of the world to watch. The reason why? It all stems back from District 13, those of whom tried to rebel from the Capitol’s harsh rule and their resulting suffering. In the end the rebellion was smashed, and now every year they celebrate The Hunger Games in order to remember the amount of control the Capitol still has over them.

 

Long story short, Effie Trinket, the Capitol representative for District 12, calls out Prim’s name to participate in The Hunger Games. Since participation is certain death, Katniss volunteers to take her sister's place in the Games. She must travel to the Capitol to undergo scrutinization by the posh and oh-so-sophisticated upper class and to train to maybe, just maybe, win the Hunger Games and come home to her mother, sister, and district.