I picked up this book because I liked the cover, and the back cover copy was all “delicious dystopian fiction!”
Had it merely been derivative, I would have shrugged and moved on. But it’s not just derivative, it’s rancid, and if I don’t vomit some words onto a screen I may actually go throw up.
So, here’s an analysis of the Hunger Games from the point of view of this book, if it were a person. I’m not going to claim to know what the author thought about the Hunger Games, but if we personified this BOOK, here’s what it thought:
Pros:
Kids killing each other!
Caste system
Rich exploiting the poor by lying to them
Social elite have Latin names
Game masters
Cons:
Female main character ew ew ew
Female supporting characters with agency and other cooties
No women get fridged, wtf.
Competent female characters hahahahahahaha
Sorry, competent female characters who aren’t b*tches that everyone hates
Women don’t simper or titter
No rape!??!
Seriously there are female characters who don’t even get THREATENED with rape Suzanne Collins what are you even
People who aren’t rich & elite get to participate and be famous
Suggests a world in which the wealthy aren’t physically and mentally superior, as if they don’t DESERVE to be in charge
Did I mention no (explicit) rape?
Only explicit mention of prostitution is a MAN–sorry, probably shouldn’t even call him that, let’s say a BUTTBOY–being coerced into it
Dudes don’t save the day wtf unnatural
Poor people get to watch the games and be entertained what no entertainment is for closers
Makes people in the Capitol seem silly 😦 😦 😦
No caste of sex workers
No explicit homophobia
Like seriously, nobody mocks anyone for being like a girl, or somebody’s buttboy
People who aren’t basically white (whatevs, we’ll put in people of color–people of LITERAL color, as in we’ll color-code the caste system, and the elite will be blonde people with amber eyes, GOLDS YES, the poor but heroic people will all be redheads, the sex slaves will be pink, and I guess the brute muscle can be black but we’ll call ‘em “Obsidian” so I can’t be called a racist)
Wait, no, I mean this, nobody mocks dudes forced into sex slavery, like what a wasted opportunity for humor
Nobody points out that girls born into the sex slave caste are never innocent or pure, that there is nothing innocent or pure about them, no no no
Not enough powerful men talking to each other about being powerful men and blood brothers
Somewhat nuanced social commentary ick
There’s nothing inherently wrong with retelling a story that’s been told before. Humans have been retelling stories forever, and I’m not going to fault someone who was inspired by the Hunger Games and wrote their own story and put their own spin on it.
But in this case, the spin Pierce Brown put on it was basically “the Hunger Games wasn’t misogynistic/homophobic/rapey/Randian enough.”
(And again, male authors writing about worlds in which women get raped as a matter of course aren’t doing it because of historical accuracy. They’re not sitting around going “well, I really hate the idea of writing about rape, but I MUST. I have NO CHOICE.”
They like writing about rape.)
So, there you go. This book is rotten to the core.
“the Hunger Games wasn’t misogynistic/homophobic/rapey/Randian enough.”
Also, I take it from your description that they thought the people running the games were the good guys?
Mooncustafer 