This was a reread that was spurred on by repeatedly watching The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. To put it simply, the first novel to ‘The Hunger Games’ trilogy hits so much harder twelve years later.

I first read ‘The Hunger Games’ in 2012 at the age of twelve so that I could see the movie. I loved the book then and I love it even more so now because I have a newfound appreciation. As a child, first reading it, I was introduced to the dystopian genre and was amazed. Now, at almost twenty-four, I see the nuances and complexities that Suzanne Collins was somehow able to write into a story that even children could understand.

As a little girl, I wanted nothing more than to be Katniss, someone I saw as this badass girl who hunts and can take care of herself, and despite thinking everyone thinks the worst of her, she still cares so deeply. Katniss was a big sister to me when I was a child. As an adult, I am horrified. I want to protect not just Katniss but all of the 1,700 and more children who were needlessly slaughtered in this fictional world. I found myself crying at Rue’s death and tearing up as Prim was called. Even at the confrontation with Thresh and the torture of Cato, I felt my heart breaking more because they are only children, children who never chose this and who are being used as a means to punish the districts. While it was hard for me personally, it made it more difficult to read it through Katniss’s point of view because she is just a teenage girl who is just trying to survive and is trying her best to not become something she isn’t.

There are many things that I want to applaud Suzanne Collins for and close to the top is how she writes not just her protagonist but her side characters. Katniss, like I said is a teenage girl and when one of the perks of re-reading this story after going through my teenage years, she is so much more relatable. She thinks of her friends and family before herself, she can sort of feelings out, she already feels like she has the weight of the world on her shoulders even before she enters that arena. Which is fair, but you also see how many people actually care about her and how she just can’t understand it. When she acts impulsively or lets her temper get the best of her you are immediately reminded that she is still a child. Peeta, a boy who is by her side nearly all of the time and is in love with her tries his best to help this girl he barely knows, it doesn’t matter what consequences he may face, just as long as Katniss is safe and on top of all of that, he and Haymitch seem to have the best understanding of the capital. Peeta, despite not being the main protagonist, is a character to perfectly balances out Katniss. I think that this is best shown when they sit on the roof together before the games begin and he makes it clear that he doesn’t believe he has a chance of making it out but hopefully, he will still die as himself and not as a pawn by the cruel and overbearing capital.

While this is my review of the very first book in the series, in my own personal opinion I think Suzanne Collins practically hits you over the head with the odd that the first step towards becoming a bad person is dehumanization and that the second is when you start to see people as someone less than you, even if they have done wrong to you, you are in control of who you become and that once you go down these paths it will only lead to self-destruction and violence.

I have read many dystopian novels and series since I was twelve and I can say with a sense of surety that ‘The Hunger Games’ will always be the most superior of them all. The story managed to convey the problems with our own society and portray it in a way that, despite seeming outlandish, is still realistic and something we can relate to. All of that with a well-paced and fascinating story, well-rounded characters, and fantastic world-building.