Review: Mockingjay - Suzanne Collins

Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins
Series: The Hunger Games #3
Genre: YA, dystopian
Published on August 24, 2010
Published by Scholastic
Pages: 392
Read From: 1.29.12 - 1.31.12









SYNOPSIS

Katniss Everdeen, girl on fire, has survived, even though her home has been destroyed. Gale has escaped. Katniss's family is safe. Peeta has been captured by the Capitol. District 13 really does exist. There are rebels. There are new leaders. A revolution is unfolding. 

It is by design that Katniss was rescued from the arena in the cruel and haunting Quarter Quell, and it is by design that she has long been part of the revolution without knowing it. District 13 has come out of the shadows and is plotting to overthrow the Capitol. Everyone, it seems, has had a hand in the carefully laid plans - except Katniss. 

The success of the rebellion hinges on Katniss's willingness to be a pawn, to accept responsibility for countless lives, and to change the course of the future of Panem. To do this, she must put aside her feelings of anger and distrust. She must become the rebels' Mockingjay - no matter what the personal cost.

Review

This truly is a trilogy where each installment gets better and better. This was by far the most brutal, the saddest, the grimmest, the most exciting, and the one with the most unexpected surprises. Ironically, this also might be the one with the biggest flaws. Katniss hasn't become unbearable, but her constant monologue of "oh, I've killed millions" (which isn't true) and her indecision to become the Mockingjay for the rebels is tiring. More so than in Catching Fire. The ending, while in idea was good, was in form a bit anticlimactic. I approved of the deaths and even how they happened, but the reasons given for their deaths were vague. And it is never made clear whether Peeta is "cured" of what the Capitol did to him, or if he just somehow manages to cope with it. The whole time, I kept wondering, "Okay, is he better now? . . . Or not?"

This is a trilogy that was definitely begging for a realistic bittersweet ending, and we Readers certainly get one. Katniss experiences a great deal of trauma, and to expect her to go back to being normal, and just be all sunny afterward is impossible; people don't recover like that from wars, where they lose friends, loved ones, their home. Therefore it couldn't end any other way, and I love this trilogy because of it. I just wish the Author had clarified a few rather important issues a bit more.

Others in This Trilogy:
1)The Hunger Games
2)Catching Fire
3)Mockingjay