New Thing: Hosting The Hunger Games Book-Club Meeting
Inspiration: Book-club
Cost: $0
Time: A few hours
Bottom Line: A pleasant evening spent hunting each other for sport and fighting to the death.
Reflection: Today was the first time I had the pleasure of hosting a book-club meeting. Our book this month was The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. Here is the Wikipedia description of the plot:
"The Hunger Games" introduces sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen, who lives in a post-apocalyptic world in the country of Panem where North America once stood. This is where a powerful government working in a central city called the Capitol holds power. In the book, the Hunger Games are an annual televised event where the Capitol chooses one boy and one girl from each district to fight to the death. The Hunger Games exist to demonstrate not even children are beyond the reach of the Capitol's power.
Collins says that the idea for The Hunger Games came from channel surfing on television. On one channel she observed people competing on a reality show and on another she saw footage of the Iraq War. The two blended together and the idea for the book was formed. The Greek myth of Theseus also served as inspiration for the book, with Collins describing Katniss as a futuristic Theseus. Her father's service in the Vietnam War helped her understand how it feels to fear the loss of a loved one.
I have to say that this book was a lot better than I expected. Teen-fiction has kind of a bad rap in my mind as playing to the worst stereotypes of what young teens are interested in: violence, love triangles, shopping, vampires, etc. While this book had some of those things, it also had dealt with some very serious overtones and the description would suggest. It reminded me of The Giver which was an favorite of mine when I was growing up.
We had a great time in the our backyard having fun over dinner. Delia danced for us which was the best.
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