Mockingjay? Read It. Adored It. Declared It the Best of the Trilogy.

Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

If I ever hear someone say that a female novelist can't write a war story, I am going to chuck this book at his or her head. So much pain and passion generated by the folly of war and nation-building is contained in its too-brief 390 pages, Mockingjay is as good an introduction to the grim paradox of war as Slaughterhouse-Five was a generation ago. Yes, it's even darker than the first two books (already quite dark), and yes, young people should read it anyway. Parts of it make the reader yell out, "What?!" but that's precisely the point. Katniss learns to question everything, and so must we. Brava to you, Ms. Collins, for even though a piece of my psyche has been vicariously wounded, I see the reason and the hope behind it. 

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Mockingjay is the best book in the Hunger Games trilogy. It's the best-written, the darkest, the scariest and the most true. Now excuse me while I grieve over the death of two particularly beloved fictional characters. 

Last night, I watched the Person of Interest rerun. It was the episode that introduced the hacker known as Root (dis bitch!!), and it involved a stakeout. I read Mockingjay for a while afterward. Then I went to bed and dreamed about a stakeout conducted by members of PETA, the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. You know, the ones who got Taraji P. Henson to pose naked to protest fur fashions - although, in all honesty, Ms. Henson seems to rather enjoy posing naked.

It took me a while to figure out that I dreamed about PETA because I was reading about Peeta Mellark. 

The blog Books and Movies discussed who should play Finnick Odair in Catching Fire recently. I don't have much of an opinion about that - I haven't even seen the Hunger Games movie yet. At this point I care much more about the books than the movies. (P.S. I'm utterly terrified at the idea of a Fifty Shades of Grey movie - I lean toward rooting for Michael Fassbender to get the role, but I also know no actor will ever measure up to my image of Christian Grey.) I don't really like any of the author's, Carrie K.'s, choices. 

I do, however, completely agree with the YouTube commenter who gave me the idea that Michael Emerson could play Beetee. That needs to happen.