The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (non-list)

At the urging of my daughter's Sunday school teacher, and just about everyone I know, I decided to deviate from the list for a few days and read the uber-popular The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins.

I think it was a good idea. I'm enjoying my other read, Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, but it's nice to read something a little lighter and funner. Ok, well I'll clarify that the subject matter of The Hunger Games isn't exactly light but the reading itself is. Sometimes you have to put down the heavy classics and pick up a nice YA book to give yourself a break.

For the two or three of you who don't know, The Hunger Games takes place in a future society located in what was North America now called Panem. There are twelve districts placed around the Capitol. In punishment for a past rebellion, the Capitol now holds a yearly, reality-show type competition in which they require each district to send one boy and one girl to find to the death, gladiator style while the entire country watches on TV. Katniss Everdeen volunteers to go in order to spare her little sister.

I was intrigued from the beginning but it wasn't until the games started that I really got sucked in. I think I finished the last half of the book in just a couple of hours. It was one of those books where you tell yourself 'just one more chapter' but when you get to the end you just have to keep going and see what happens next.

Thankfully I was able to borrow both the first and second book from my daughter's teacher and I'm excited to start the next one.