The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

Publisher- Scholastic Press

Publication Date- September 14, 2008

Pages- 374 

Series- The Hunger Games Trilogy

Awards-  2008 Publishers Weekly's "Best Books of the Year" in 2008, The New York Times "Notable Children's Book of 2008"  2009 winner of the Golden Duck Award in the Young Adult Fiction Category, 2008 Cybil Winner for fantasy and science-fiction books, One of School Library Journal's Best Books 2008, 2008 Booklist Editors' Choice in 2008.2011, won the 2011 California Young Reader Medal. 

Sometime in the future, America doesn’t exist. In its place is a country called Panem. Panem is divided into 12 districts that all have their own specialties, and the Capitol, which controls the country. Every year, 2 people, one boy and one girl, are chosen from each district to compete in the Hunger Games, where the 24 tributes are put into an arena and are expected to fight to the death while every citizen of Panem watches on live TV. Katniss Everdeen lives on the outskirts of District 12, the poorest district. When Katniss’s sister, Prim, is chosen as their district’s tribute, Katniss volunteers in her place, and promises she will try to win for her.

I have to admit, it took me forever to get past the first two chapters of this book. I read chapter 1 and put it down, picking it up months later. (This was when it first came out, and it had not been very publicized.) But I powered through to Chapter 3, and I couldn’t put it down. It was great, to say the least. I wasn’t expecting it to be this good I wasn’t expecting there to really be any good action in it. I was wrong. I’ve never really been into Dystopian, but this has totally changed my mind. This is told through Katniss’s point of view, which really adds to the emotion. You will feel like you are in the arena, your heart will be pumping. It is action packed and emotional, a really great page turner.