The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes

I liked this book, even though there were a few points where the story dragged a bit. That's pretty much what knocked a star off. It's been a while since I read the original series, so I think I'm going to have to revisit them just so I can compare the difference with the games, the districts, and the Capital. This had a very interesting take and I didn't expect to have any type of good feeling towards Snow, but I always love for a character to have more depth than to just be pure good or evil.

Excellent. Even the part that annoyed me fit somehow. Brava.

The narrator got on my nerves a ton, just because Snow's worldview is so messed up, but I liked the different perspective and how the author was able to stick with such a disagreeable narrator.

3.5

Was my favorite book in the series!! Dives deep into Snow’s character and upbringing with an engaging story, language and world-building is incredible.

I love Suzanne Collins. I'll read whatever she adds to this series, it's so important. There are scenes in this book that hit me so hard, and I don't mean a character dying, I mean seeing life depicted so accurately. Highly recommend. Put it in schools. If for some reason you want to read this book but not the original trilogy, you can do that, the effect is the same.

Review with spoilers:

My favorite scene in the book is when the mentors are talking in class with Dr. Gaul and the dean. It hits me hard because it perfectly portrays the life-changing moment that every teen in the world, in every country, in every era, will experiance - the moment when you realize that your government is corrupt, there's nothing you can do about it, and even when you're old enough it will never matter how much you do because you simply cannot change the way the world works. There will always be power-hungry people who rise to power. You can have a revolution but the cycle will begin again and nothing will truly change.

I watched the movie first and I heard a lot of people talk about how it didn't show how unhinged Coriolanus is from the beginning. But reading the book I thought it humanized him even more. Even more so the side characters, specifically the classmates for me. I think the book does a really good job of showing you the shift in his personality. It basically shows you the process of him being brainwashed by the Capitol government and you see when he starts to accept it because he's just knocked down again and again and he's got a family to take care of and he's gotta play the game if he wants to win.

It’s a good story, but holy cow it’s grim! If you thought the other Hunger Games books were bleak you’re in for a rough ride with this one. The first half of the book is one of the high points of the series. The second half isn’t bad by any means, it’s just very dark.

This was awful.

I was expecting to love this, but the nicest thing I can say is that it’s technically readable. (Edit: I'd originally thought this justified a two star rating, but it doesn't. This is a one-star book.) It was a struggle to get through this 540 PAGE BOOK, which felt twice as long as it actually was.

I went into this with...not unrealistically high hopes (I wasn't expecting the author to be able to recreate the magic of the original trilogy), but I was optimistic. I liked the excerpt I'd read, and the title was intriguing. I didn't have a problem, in theory, with Snow being the protagonist.

The problems came in the execution.

So here they are. The problems, from most to least significant (oh, and here there be all the spoilers):

- The plot is nonsensical and lacks any sense of cohesion. The most glaring instance of this is the third act, which comes literally out of nowhere (there is literally no foreshadowing, and, really--would it have been that hard to drop a couple lines in the first, you know, TWO-THIRDS OF THE BOOK about how bad kids get sent to become Peacekeepers?) and completely disrupts everything that's been set up so far, like it's suddenly a completely different book. In fact, there's no foreshadowing of many of the major plot points and character actions. At it's core, though, is this a book about Snow and Lucy, or Snow and Sejamus? I guess it doesn't matter because neither of those plots make any f*****g sense. Throughout, the pacing is completely off, with scenes that seem to have no real point with no real conflict (like the picnic scene, or all the singing scenes). There are dropped plot threads galore (like...what happened to the girl that turned into the snake, or the other weird experiments that were going on? What happened to the rest of the Snow family?), and major plot points being unexplained (namely, Lucy Grey's fate). This monster is 560 pages--the least the author could do was provide answers.

- Characters were one-dimensional and forgettable. I couldn't keep his classmates straight (which, frankly, didn't really matter since their roles were as interchangeable as background characters). Same with the faculty. Same with the other recruits. Same with the Covey. The only character with an ounce of life was Sejamus, and after the first third of the book he stops developing and just solidifies into a cardboard cutout.

- The main character is...just boring. I love a villain’s origin story (even if they're totally unsympathetic and evil! I want to understand their genius, their motivation), but it seems more like Coryo stumbled ass-backwards into his position of power. He’s not likeable, but he’s not delightfully villainous, either: he's largely indecisive and unsure of himself with zero personality. Even worse, his motivations are completely unintelligible and inconsistent. It starts with him seemingly wanting to preserve the Snow name (which, great, that could be the start of a great character arc about being willing to do anything just to grow his family's--and then his personal--power), and then it becomes him wanting his tribute to win the Hunger Games because he wants a scholarship….or he's in love with her...or it's both? Then he becomes a Peacekeeper and it's like he doesn't really have any other choice so he decides he might as well chase after Lucy, but then maybe he's actually in love with her because he's willing to risk everything and run away with her, then….he tries to kill her? What?? Then he flips to trying to kill Lucy Gray and it’s just...what? He’s constantly indecisive--one minute recording Sejamus and the next upset about what he’s done, then later brushing it off as no big deal. Honestly, I think writing this in third person was a huge mistake, as it really created additional psychic distance. If there was ever a time we needed insight into a character's head, it's this book.

- Lucy Grey is insufferable. Also, she’s one of the dumbest women alive. I'm still completely confused about her motivations and what makes her tick.

- The love story was unbelievable. And really boring. I'm still not sure if either of them loved the other, or if I was supposed to believe either of them loved the other. I think this was supposed to be the emotional centerpiece of the book, but boy did it fail.

- The only thing more boring than reading song lyrics is having those song lyrics explained ad nauseum. Especially when I've already figured out what they mean. Seriously, there are probably a dozen multi-verse songs that are written out in full with commentary...some more than once. Why. Why didn't your editor cut this.

- Too much fan service. The characters mention katniss as something they eat, multiple times. There are numerous renditions of “The Hanging Tree.” The Hob. The Seam. The cabin by the lake. Apparently there are, like, three places in District 12, and Coryo hangs out in all of them.

- The names are unbearably dumb. As an example, the tributes from the aquatic district are named Coral and Mizzen (a type of mast). This makes no sense and is just idiotic--my parents are both bankers, but they didn’t name me something like Annuity or Debit. The names were a little weird in the original trilogy, but at least it was believable that a single family would choose to name their kids after plants (Katniss and Primrose). It’s less believable that an entire district would name their children after their main industry. Then there's the Covey (who are basically knock-off Romani). Their name means a flock of birds, and of course they all sing, and they like bright colors and all their last names are colors because get it??!

I can't go on. Suffice to say I thought I'd enjoy this book, but it was an awful combination of boring, confusing, and long.

I originally tried to give this review without spoilers, but I realize that's difficult because there's a spoiler that's central to discussing the merits of this book, so here's my revised review:

An interesting insight into the early days of The Hunger Games and the young Coriolanus Snow, I have the feeling this book will probably end up being disliked by most Huber Game fans, but I enjoyed it! Knowing that the protagonist becomes the antagonist in Katniss’s story, it’s just a question of how and when he starts to become the man who would be President Snow. I think it actually does a good job showing how people of influence and power think and behave, the sort of priorities some of them have, and both the benefits and dangers involved.

At 18, Corolianus Snow is an overachieving young man at the top of his class. His once well off family has been ravaged by the war, losing all their money, and the lives of both his parents and his cousin Tigris's parents (yes, that Tigris). Snow knows his best chance at restoring his family's standing in the upper echelons of Capitol society, and his only way to afford to go the university and have a chance at the kind of future he dreams of, is to win a "prize" (scholarship). As a student at the prestigious Academy, he is tapped to serve as one of the 24 first ever mentors to this year's Hunger Games tributes. If his tribute does well, he will most likely get a good recommendation and thus a good prize.

When Snow is assigned the female tribute from Distract 12, his hope is initially dashed. He feels it's a reflection on how low his family has fallen to receive a tribute so unlikely to win. However, much like Katniss will 50 years later, District 12's female tribute defies expectations. After her name is called at the reaping, Lucy Gray quickly attacks another girl with a snake- the motive for which is explained later in the book. The attack disrupts the regular Reaping procedure, and so Lucy Gray is left nearly alone on the stage and so entertains the crowd with a song. She is not really District 12, after all; she is a "Covey", a found family that used to travel between districts to perform for the citizens. Since the war, though, the Covey have been stuck in District 12.

Even early on, Snow is shown to be extremely cunning. He is constantly thinking of his image, how his actions or the actions of those associated with him will affect his image and standing. This leads him to an idea to make the tributes try harder to impress the people of the Capitol, and for the people of the Capitol to feel invested in the games- up to that point, citizens across Panem have either shown little interest in or even had access to watch the Hunger Games. What good is punishing the districts and showing the full force of the Capitol if no one cares or can even watch it? So Snow comes up with the idea to allow citizens of the Capitol to place bets on the tributes, plus for the first time ever, Capitol citizens can affect the game by sponsoring gifts for the tributes while they're in the arena- primarily food and water.

This gives Lucy Gray an incentive to try harder to impress the people of the Capitol, which means opening up to Snow and performing for the Capitol. She sings before the games, while all the tributes are being held in an empty monkey cage at the zoo. She sings during her interview. She is charming and sweet, simply not like the rest of the tributes. Along the way of getting the citizens of the Capitol to fall for her and support her, Snow also begins to fall for Lucy Gray. She seems to feel the same way, but he's never quite sure if she means it or if she's just trying to have a leg up in the arena (making his doubt over Katniss and Peeta's relationship resonate that much more).

Meanwhile a fellow mentor, Sejanus Plinth, questions the point of the games at all. He finds it barbaric. Of course, his attitude may be because he is originally District- his family moved to the Capitol from District 2 when his father became rich from his munitions company. Sejanus is seemingly blessed by having one of the strongest tributes assigned to him, the boy from District 2. The tribute, Marcus, was a former classmate, making Sejanus double down on his distaste for the Hunger Games.

A lot of events happen before the games that affect the games themselves, removing both tributes and mentors from the competition before the games have even officially begun. Between the early losses and how many gifts Lucy Gray has received, plus their plan for her to sneak rat poison into the arena, he feels good about his odds of receiving a prize for his performance as a mentor. Even if she doesn't win, if she survives the first night, he will have defied people's expectations for her. Spoiler within a spoiler- she doesn't merely survive the first night, she ends up as the victor of the 10th Hunger Games.

Her victory comes at a cost to Snow, though. He'd taken certain steps to give Lucy Gray a leg up in the games, and when the evidence is compiled, he's told he must enlist as a Peacekeeper or else have his treacherous actions exposed. He enlists, but requests to be assigned to District 12, hoping that Lucy Gray will return to the district as well and they can continue their relationship. Sure enough, she does return to the district, and she really did love him too!

Well, insta-love. Because all together, they probably spent less than 12 hours together total before the games started. They think they're in love because of the heightened emotions of the games, but they don't really know each other. He says things and has attitudes towards thing that shock her, and she isn't quite what he'd thought she was either. Her history with a Covey man makes him jealous and constantly doubt her, and certain things that appealed to him when planning on how she could appeal to the Capitol now make him see her as soft and confusing.

Sejanus also joins the Peacekeepers as punishment for his actions against the Hunger Games and is also sent to District 12. Snow is happy to have someone familiar there with him, but begins to regret his association with hum, as Sejanus appears to be plotting with Lucy Gray's ex and other potential rebels. Snow ends up taking certain actions that have disastrous outcomes for Sejanus, for which Snow is torn because he did what was right for Capitol but at the cost of betraying a friend. Shortly thereafter, he and Lucy Gray attempt to run away from District 12, away from all the districts and heard north, where they'd heard people lived outside the reach of the Capitol.

This is where we see Snow really become the man we know him to be from the original trilogy- power hungry, cold, untrusting. While in the Capitol he rationalized his behavior and personality with "taking care of his family and their legacy," those reasons get peeled away and we see him for what he truly is. His contributions to the games don't create the system Katniss and the rebels eventually take down, but those contributions do shape the games into what we see with Katniss: flashier, more heartless, more brutal, and never-ending.

Overall, I very much enjoyed this book, though it's certainly not a perfect one. Snow's descent into his darker side is a bit rushed but still earned. In the timeline of the book, all this action is very rushed- I think it's about a month or six weeks start to finish, and his true darkness doesn't really show until the last few chapters. Lucy Gray is just a step or two beyond a manic pixie dream girl, but she's also presented through Snow's eyes, and he was really in love with his idea of who she was versus her actual self, so it makes sense she wouldn't feel as realized. As with the first novel, I was surprised at how quickly the games were over, but I do feel it was well paced- we had a good portion of time before the games started, a good amount of time focusing on the games, and then a good portion of time focusing on his life as a Peacekeeper.

Snow is literally the worst. His need for control is atrocious. He was a creation of his environment and he doesn’t stray from horrible it is.