general

• quick summary - the backstory of president snows's first involvement in the hunger games as a teenager mentor to lucy gray baird (the girl from district 12) told through his twisted perspective on war, human nature, and thirst for power and control.
• key themes - power, greed, human nature, authority, oppression, war, betrayal.
• favorite character - tigris! she had the opposite of snow's character, despite having grown up in the same circumstances. I was rooting for her and wanted snow to follow her lead. I admired her kind, caring nature and saw her as an example of how not all capitol people have fallen for its distorted policies + I love lucy gray and I would have loved to see her perspective too! she's such a smart, creative and self-reliant girl.

interests

• what i found interesting - I had never read a book where the villain did not redeem themself in one way or another; this book was the opposite. throughout tbosas, snow just became more and more morally corrupted. I was able to feel sorry for him in the beginning and was even rooting for him to win (despite knowing what a cruel man he is in the og series), but in the third part of the book that quickly went away. I admired collins' writing and how she could write such a compelling villain without stripping him from his humanity (again, in the beginning).
• fav quote - "you go to sleep now, you hear, jessup? You go on, it's my turn to stand guard (...) that's right. let yourself go. how are you going to dream if you don't go to sleep?" broke my heart </3

books it reminded me of

• thg series lol

further reading

• follow-up context research - the opening quotes by hobbes and locke brought me right back to my 10th grade philosophy class! I hope to read these authors again and go back to the themes debated in the book.

rating

• 4.5/5 - I had no plans of reading this very long book if my friend hadn't dragged me to the cinema. I read the og series just once and despite liking it very much, it was such an emotional, difficult read that I never went back. I am happy I fell in love with the story while watching the film and my sister gave me a copy for christmas (I usually read the book first). despite the setting being similar to its sequels, the lack of wealth and security and the threat of war is very much present in tbosas. stripped down from all the fluff, the games portrayed in the book appear as what they really are: a horrible and cruel punishment for innocent people. I absolutely loved the first and second parts, but the third one was a little slower - or maybe I dragged it because I did not want to read what I knew was going to happen. I wished I saw a little bit more of how the games affected lucy gray, but I suppose that did not cross snow's mind so collins did not include it. overall, a fantastic read on the corruption of human character and what happens what we let ourselves go down the wrong path (there is very much a choice).