"The Hunger Games": SciFi at the top of its game.

My latest obsession (as though I needed one) is the trilogy of books known as "The Hunger Games" written by Suzanne Collins and set to be adapted into movies next year. I'm addicted, and I'll try my best to explain how and why.

Several months ago a very good friend of mine informed me that I needed to read a book called "The Hunger Games." A 'youth series' set in a future dystopian North America, plagued by wars, natural and climatological disaster, divided into twelve starved districts together known as Panem. Each year the Capitol stages the "Hunger Games" which require each district to send one boy and one girl to fight for the chance to win their district a year's supply of food. Of course at the time I groaned, probably rolled my eyes, at 'youth series' and based on the explanation passed it off as a "Lord of the Flies" clone and moved on to other reading.

These days when I read I tend to alternate back and forth between reading something Non-Fiction (usually space exploration history) and Fiction (usually science fiction). So when I finished reading "Dragonfly" a space history book about the Russian space program and MIR I popped open my Kindle app and discovered I had already downloaded "The Hunger Games" (book one of the trilogy) "What the heck?" I thought and started reading.

Believe me when I say nothing could have prepared me how completely enraptured I became by these books. I found the first book "The Hunger Games" a bit slow but by the end I knew there was absolutely no way I wasn't going to read the next in the series, "Catching Fire." It was a Saturday night and I punched up the Kindle version on Amazon got about 10 chapters in, woke up that Sunday and with the exception of going out to dinner read "Catching Fire" in a single sitting. I downloaded the third book "Mockingjay" and went through it in the course of the next day staying up that Monday night until 1:20 in the morning to finish it. I literally couldn't get enough. It's hard for me to even recall the last time I read any book in a single sitting but very likely not since I was a kid.

Since finishing the final book and in between staring endlessly at Twitter for any news, links, etc. related to the series I have been giving a lot of though to why exactly the series struck such strong chord.  Then I realized today that this series checks a number of the boxes I typically use as benchmarks for great SciFi. 

A rich universe. Absolutely there's no denying that one could get lost imagining what it would be like to explore the rich and disturbing universe of Panem and its Districts. Compelling characters (okay any really great story has these but). "The Hunger Games" is full of incredibly deep and compelling characters. Just to underscore that and the richness of the universe, I'm convinced that even the most insignificant character in this series could spawn at least one fascinating book all their own.

Don't get bogged down in the Sci of the Fi. I find that often SciFi gets a bit bogged down in the Sci, don't over do it. There's some cool science and tech in "The Hunger Games" but it doesn't over do things it's there, your appreciate it, but you're not tripping over dilithium crystals and tachyon particles.

Science Fiction at its best should aspire to be a prism that takes our own humanity and reflects it back in a thought provoking way. Even if by some chance "The Hunger Games" fails to move you it's absolutely impossible that it won't make you think. Primarily about our values, how we treat one another, how we desire to be treated by one another as well but also by society and the government that rules it. 

For these reasons alone I have no problem what-so-ever putting "The Hunger Games" in the same category as classics such as Orwell's "1984" as one example. I can't recommend it highly enough. If you're at all intriugied now is a great time to pick up the trilogy as there's still some summer left for a great summer read but also the first movie installment based on Book 1 "The Hunger Games" is filming now and set to release in March 2012.

So check it out on Amazon or Goodreads (another recent addiction). Oh and of course, "May the odds be ever in your favor."

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(I also need to plug District Tribute's great album/original score inspired by the books which I was listening two as I wrote this post, more on it in a future post, but if you're already a fan of the series check it out here! http://samcushion.bandcamp.com/ or on iTunes!!)