dissecting the games, ch 5 & 6

And on we go.  Remember if you haven't read the books, don't read this post!

Stuff in chapters 5 & 6:

• Cinna is awesome
• Peeta & Katniss have their first real moment together
• Katniss becomes The Girl of Fire
• Katniss gives Peeta a kiss on the cheek - for strategic purposes?
• Effie is an idiot
• Katniss meets an Avox and the room stands still
• Peeta comes to Katniss's rescue

After quickly meeting Katniss's styling team we begin to wonder if everyone in the Capitol has fluff for brains, but then we meet Cinna.  Katniss notices right away that he's different.  He talks differently, dresses differently and acts differently than everyone else she's met so far.  We learn that this is Cinna's first games and that he requested District 12.  It makes me wonder....is Cinna's part in the revolution something he was already a part of or was he a part of it because of Katniss?  hmmmmm

We all know that Peeta loves Katniss, but mostly because we already read the books.  Katniss has no idea because she isn't thinking like that.  She's thinks that Peeta is just trying to keep her off balance so it will be easier to kill her later.  They have their first real moment together while laughing at Haymitch during the opening ceremonies.  It's during these moments where I wish she would just let go and trust, but to be honest, would you?  I can't even imagine the insanity she's a part of at this moment.

So yeah, Effie is an idiot.  And she's power hungry, or at least image hungry.  She's been irritated to be saddled with the poorest district with the most pathetic victor ever.  When she begins to see a glimmer of hope that maybe these aren't the weakest tributes yet she gets a little more interested.  I'm not sure if her helping them is solely for her own gain or because she cares about them.  There are moments when you think her care is genuine, but those moments are few and far between.

And then there's the Avox.  Someone convicted of a great crime gets their tongue cut off and is then a servant to the Capitol.  The movie doesn't really go into this at all.  Katniss makes a comment to Peeta about how they'll cut off their tongues, but it doesn't sound like she's serious, like it's a real punishment.  When Katniss recognizes the Avox serving them dinner the adults in the room (Haymitch, Effie, Cinna & Portia) all freeze.  Haymitch and Effie insist there's no way she could know the Avox and Peeta jumps in with the name of a girl who Katniss must've been thinking about (who looks nothing like the girl here).  They both know he just covered for her, but it does the trick and the adults back off.  Katniss later tells Peeta how she and Gale saw that girl and another boy outside the fence.  She saw the girl get sucked up by a hovercraft & the boy get speared.  While the whole thing is brief and seemingly unimportant, as a whole in hindsight it has more bearing on the story.

Coming soon.....training!

dissecting the games, ch 3 & 4

I can't keep up with the twitter business.  Yeah, I suck.  Oh well.  I'm still reading the tweets Lauren posts & reading along so I guess maybe I don't suck that bad?

Remember, if you haven't read the books, don't read this post.  If you don't want to read the books (cause you're crazy) but do want to see the movies, don't read this post.

Anyhoo....let's move on to chapters 3 & 4.  Here's what we know:

• Katniss is already preparing for the games - no crying
• despite her bitterness she loves her mother
• doesn't really trust her to take care of Prim
• Peeta's father is much better than his mother
• the mockingjay pin comes from Madge
• Gale's goodbye was the worst - made me cry - again
• District 12 is in the Appalachians
• the Capitol is in Colorado
• Madge starts the revolution?
• Katniss's birthday is May 8th
• she's named for a plant
• Haymitch might not be as useless as thought

 So the names have been called and Katniss & Peeta are whisked away to the fancy(er than they're used to) rooms where they'll say goodbye to family & friends.  Katniss wastes no time in instructing her mother & Prim how to take care of themselves while she's gone.  And despite her inner monologue insisting that she's not going to return to District 12 she begins taking steps to fight, like making sure she doesn't cry so cameras can't catch it and people think she's weak.

Peeta's father comes to her and gives her a bag of cookies and tells her that he will make sure that Prim is taken care of.  Madge arrives to give Katniss the mockingjay pin.  And finally, Gale.  He does what Katniss did to her mother & Prim, his best to make sure she can survive the games.  And he too promises that her family doesn't starve.

On the train ride to the Capitol we learn that the Capitol is somewhere in the Rocky Mountains and District 12 is in the Appalachian Mountains.  While the Appalachians span from eastern Canada through 18 US states we can assume from the fact that District 12 supplies coal that they're somewhere in the Coal Region of Northern Pennsylvania.

Katniss studies Madge's mockingjay pin for the first time and realizes that the pin is sort of a slap in the face to the Capitol.  Does this mean that it was Madge, not Katniss who really starts the revolution?  And maybe even more so as it seems to be deliberate whereas Katniss seemed to stumble upon rebellion?

We learn a lot more about Katniss's father here and the sting of losing him is harsh.  She recounts the months after he died again and the moments after Peeta's offer where it seemed hope had finally taken flight.  She finds katniss, the plant she's named after, growing in a pond and remembers her father's joke 'As long as you find yourself, you'll never starve.'

Finally, Haymitch starts to become the mentor he is supposed to be for Katniss & Peeta.  He makes them a deal after the a quick fight at the breakfast table.  If they don't interfere with his drinking he will stay sober enough to help them.  There's some 'controversy' about Haymitch in the movie when it comes to his drinking.  Though I believe Woody Harrelson did a great job as Haymitch, he did seem to get - and stay - sober really quickly.  There wasn't much discussion and it didn't seem like he was the alcoholic in the movie that he was in the book.  I'm not sure I necessarily agree with this.  Though there are certain points where it's mentioned that he takes a swig out of his flask after the vomiting on the train incident he seems to keep everything under control.

And there we are at the end of Chapter 4...

dissecting the games

I mentioned here that I was going to be rereading The Hunger Games with Busy Bee Lauren.  I've actually even tweeted....twice I think.  I thought about writing as I went along here, but wasn't making any promises.  I'll try though....it's mostly going to be a lot of comparison to the movie, but also just trying to recapture that feeling from the first time I read it.  It's been long enough since the last read that everything starts to feel a little new again....if you haven't read the books (first of all, you're nuts - go out and get thee to a library please) then you should skip over these posts for I'll be holding nothing back.

There's so much information in chapters one and two that never really made it to the big screen.  Already at the end of chapter two we know these things:

• Katniss loves Prim fiercely
• She pretty much despises her mother
• Her mother came from 'wealth'
• And is pretty much useless 
• Katniss is hard, bitter & older than her years
• We know what tesserae is (and it's not a tile)
• Katniss's father died in the mines
• There was a revolution
• District 13 existed and was obliterated
• The Capitol sucks
• Gale is important
• Gale is more vocally passionate about his hatred for the Capitol
• Peeta basically saved Katniss & her family's life
• Peeta's mom is an asshole
• Peeta loves Katniss

That's really a lot of info for 33 pages.  And think of how much of that wasn't really in the movie.  Big stuff too like District 13.  I guess that it will be talked about in the next movie??  I mean, you can't leave them out, right?  But really, they were a big part of the first revolution so you'd think they'd get a mention.  Did they even really explain the reason for the Hunger Games in the movie?  I don't even remember.

Little things, like Haymitch groping Effie and falling off the stage.  It's small, but it was part of a portrait.  Katniss doesn't find the mockingjay pin at The Hob.  She sells strawberries to Madge.  Little things....

It doesn't matter how many times I read it I am still hopeful that another name gets pulled out of that glass ball.  How silly is that?  Rereading just reminds me of what a talented writer Suzanne Collins is. There are so many things I love so quickly.  The crowd going silent while Effie is trying to illicit applause for Katniss's volunteering.  The three fingered salute that begins the revolution though no one really knows it at the time.  Peeta taking a blow to the head to feed Katniss.  Despite her grudge against her mother, the hopeful little girl in her comes out for a moment when she sees the dress her mother has laid out for her for The Reaping.

I want so badly to love Katniss, but it's hard.  I respect her.  She's smart, resourceful, tough and honest, but she is not loveable.  And I guess that's the way it should be.  Not that there weren't moments that I didn't get glimpses of the person underneath all that hardness.  I did, but in the book so far we haven't gotten there yet.

heartsick

Every month I get four emails from the library.  It's their list of suggested books based on genre.  So I get one for YA, one for Horror, one for general fiction and one for Thrillers/Suspense.  I never read them, but I save the emails for a time when I feel like I might need a new author to read.

Three days ago I got the Thriller/Suspense email so I thought, hey, I'm not loving anything I'm reading right now so let's take a gander at what my good friend the library suggests for me.  The first book was by Chelsea Cain and it was called Kill You Twice.  The first sentence of the description said something like 'In this fifth installment of the series featuring Archie Sheridan (and serial killer Gretchen Lowell)....'  Basically, they had me at 'serial killer Gretchen Lowell'.  A female serial killer?  I'm in.

Of course, you know me, I have to start at the beginning.  So I went to the library and picked up Heartsick.

I read it in about 3 hours. 

Totally worth it.  Of course, you don't read about female serial killers too often.  Everyone knows who Aileen Wournos is and if you do hear about a female SK she poisoned her victims or like in Wournos's case claim self defense.  Rarely, do you hear of a female who tortures her victims and that's where Gretchen Lowell comes in.  

The only part of the book that bugs me is Archie Sheridan.  Yes, female SKs are rare, but burned out, addicted, broken detectives are not.  Granted, Sheridan's reasons for being broken are way different, still I didn't fall in love with him.  Didn't really feel sorry for him.  He was my means of getting to Gretchen.

There are basically two stories here.  One is the present day story.  Someone is kidnapping teenage girls and dumping their bodies along the river in Portland, Oregon.  The mayor wants a task force convened and he wants Archie to head it.  Why?  Because Archie is the hero cop who broke the case of the Beauty Killer.  Albeit, he broke it when she kidnapped and tortured him for ten days, but nonetheless, he survived and she went to jail.  Barely functioning he knows he needs to get his shit together to find out who is killing these girls.

The second story comes and goes.  It's the ten days of torture that Archie suffered at the hands of Gretchen.  And here is where you start to understand why he is the way he is and more importantly, who Gretchen is.  

I've read some reviews in which people said that the present day story was pale in comparison to learning Gretchen and Archie's past, but I disagree.  Though at first, there doesn't seem to be anything truly shocking about The After School Killer (stupid name) there are ties that bind both stories together.

Cain doesn't spend a lot of time on other characters.  There's Susan, the writer from The Herald who is sent to profile Archie.  Susan is damaged goods so it seems she recognizes in Archie more than the people who love him do.  Susan's role is a little coincidental, but everything seems to come full circle.

Seriously good read.  It's when you read a book like this that you realize how crappy some of the authors out there really are.  The authors that grace the NYT Bestsellers list twice a year with their manufactured books with no grip, no hook, you buy the book because you've been buying their books forever.  I'm not saying their books are total crap (*coughJamesPattersoncough*), but how is it that everyone raves about them and yet I had never heard of Chelsea Cain?  It's a travesty I tell you.

what am i reading now?

I'll give you one guess.

The other day I was feel nostalgic for books that I have read multiple times and loved every second of reading them.  I'm trying to slog through the books that have been sitting on my tbr shelf, but I'm just not feeling it.  I did pick up a book by a new (to me) author and so far am loving it, but everything else just isn't exciting so far.

Yesterday I decided that I was going to reread The Hunger Games.  Then I picked up this new book (Heartsick by Chelsea Cain) and got into that so I put it off.

Then today Ms. Lauren over at Busy Bee Lauren wrote this post about rereading The Hunger Games together so I thought it must be meant to be.  If you want to join in the reading happiness you can participate in the tweeting madness that will occur starting tonight.  I'm @knowitnotsomuch and Lauren is tweeting specifically about the book here @TheLaurenGames Of course, you can follow me on twitter, but I'll warn you that my previous attempts to keep up with that junk have been grossly unsuccessful.  For this group reading thing it's best if you follow Lauren.

Maybe I'll post about each chapter as I go along, but I'm not making any promises 'cause I pretty much suck at bloggie follow through.  *sigh*

So get your books out and your favorite HG bookmark & let's get to reading!

the affair

Quite simply this Jack Reacher story is about both beginnings and endings.

It's 1997 and Reacher is sent out to Carter Crossing, Mississippi to investigate undercover.  A woman has been found, throat cut and suspicion has fallen on the local base.  Only, it can't.  The Army can't afford to have the spot light on this base and they can't afford for an investigation to prove what they already have an inkling about.  So Garber sends Reacher in to find out what's really going on and how best to protect the Army.

Of course, Reacher isn't going to assist in some kind of cover up.  He's too good for that and maybe that's why Garber sends him.  But this story, even though it takes place almost 15 years ago, shows a much more decisive Reacher. 

Here and there you'll find little Easter egg facts inserted for those who have read the series in its entirety.  Neagley makes an appearance and the story certainly does set up the events that will happen in the first Reacher novel, The Killing Floor.

This book doesn't disappoint and in fact, I'm slightly sad that certain characters never show up in the series, but then that's not surprising considering Lee Child's style.  The book answers a lot of questions about Reacher and why he really mustered out.  I let the book lead me along the whole way and kept changing my mind at every single turn.

He's still my favorite book hero.

shock wave

Virgil is sent out to a small Minnesota river town after to find out who is trying to stop megastore Pyemart from moving in.  So far two bombs and two people have been killed and Virgil is tasked with stopping the bomber from killing any more innocent people.

I just really enjoy Virgil Flowers.  Almost more than Lucas Davenport.  He's hilarious.  Easy going and smart, but not afraid to throw a punch when it's needed.  The difference between Lucas and Virgil is that while Lucas does step outsides the lines of the law quite often, Virgil doesn't so much but he still feels like he's not so straight laced.  He also tends to be more down to earth and uses the community to help him find answers.

Pyemart is basically a WalMart and the small town of Butternut just can't sustain a huge superstore like that and support its local mom and pop businesses.  Then there's the possible pollution into the river that runs through the town and brings trout fisherman from all over.  So there's plenty of people who don't want PyeMart to move in and plenty who believe that the city council was bribed.  Plenty of mad people in this town, which means plenty of suspects for Virgil to wade through when the bombing start.

Great series, great book.  You don't necessarily have to read these in order, but there are references to characters from previous books.  Either way, this is one not to miss.