Book Review: Mockingjay (Book 3: Hunger Games Series)

Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Hold on a sec while I wipe the icky gore off my kitchen walls.

Sorry for the wait, but my brain just exploded. It was having a hard time processing the variety of emotions I felt as I closed the cover of my Nook.

Let’s see if I can make some sense of all this:

1. Anger: “What the h#@&? This is how it ends!”
2. Despair: “I waited months for this…now what?”
3. Sadness: “Really, Suzanne Collins, really? It had to be this way?”
4. Understanding: “Ok. I get it. But I don’t have to agree with it.”

Mockingjay did all the things a good book is supposed to do. It presented life-like relatable characters, it engendered an emotional response, it came to a resolution. I am not happy with the resolution. I feel unhinged and a little nauseous with the conclusion of the Hunger Games series.

I shouldn’t have hoped for a musical-type happy ending, the two previous novels should have warned that idea away. But I wanted something a little more satisfying. Don’t get me wrong, the book was packed with action sequences and more gore than the opening scenes of Saving Private Ryan. And perhaps that’s why I’m leaving unfilled…it was a little too real, a little too accurate a description of human nature. People just don’t paint a happy smile on their faces and forget the atrocities of their past.

It was a more “Deathly Hallows” (from the Harry Potter series) than “Breaking Dawn” (from Twilight). So if you want to prepare yourself before reading Mockingjay, remember how you felt when you completed those other novels.



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