Corbin Jensen
This book was a slow burn and then an absolute forest fire at full blaze by the end. I was not expecting that final twist at the very end. Thoroughly enjoyed this one!
I'm glad I read it but I'm not sure I enjoyed reading it. It felt too much like Covid 2020 at times which I think made it more engaging but also less "fun" simultaneously. It's crazy that this was written in 2018 and I wonder how my perception would be different if I had read it pre- pandemic.
Contains spoilers
We've already had a Hunger Games book about a quarter quell where Beetee, Wyris, Haymitch, and Plutarch try to blow up the arena to stick it to President Snow... it's called Catching Fire. This book just does that story over again and in doing so makes it highly unbelievable that Snow would ever let that group of people together again 25 years later to do the same thing a second time.
Was an entertaining read at the least but makes no sense in context of the original trilogy.
Beautifully written re-imagination of the Huck Finn story. The character arc of Jim becoming James is intriguing and empowering. The interplay between "wrong" and "right" and justice is captivating. A very quick read, which was good because I didn't want to put it down anyways.
I enjoyed the experience of reading this book...but I'm not sure I enjoyed the book itself. The prose was at times beautiful and amazing and other times corny and took me out of it. The story was good, the characters were fine, I personally would have liked a little more sci-fy to balance out the heavy romance lean of this book. But that's just preference.
