Mockingjay, by Suzanne Collins

[rachelmanija]

I didn’t love the first two books in this series - the worldbuilding is flimsy and I couldn’t help comparing them to the remarkably similar Battle Royale movie, which I like a lot more - but I liked Katniss, her narrative voice, and the energy of the story enough to keep reading. That was a mistake.

Not only is Mockingjay awesomely depressing, but

Comments

[buymeaclue]

When he recovers, gets married, and is happy

Oh, fer fuck's sake. I quit reading when I found out that he dies--I'd already pretty much given up, but that was the final straw (Cinna would have been, except I was positive at the end of the previous book that he was dead). But married? Finnick? That's even worse!

There were so many interesting things that could have been done with the Annie thing, and Collins went for none of them, and instead: exactly the most obvious and boring explanation of who-what-why possible. Disappointing. Very disappointing.

[rachelmanija]

And he never enjoyed sex or being sexy, except with Annie! It was all rape!

[asakiyume]

People seem to have WILDLY different reactions to this book.

[rachelmanija]

I think most people liked it way more than I did.

[asakiyume]

Yeah, in general it appears to be popular, which, from the subject matter, sort of puzzled me. But I gather even among people who liked the series, people were divided about this last book.

Asymmetric power situations fascinate me, but not when it's just an excuse to handwring about how bad the underdogs have it. Okay, fine, they have things bad--now what happens next? (sorry... that's an abrupt remark, but it's all I salvaged of a longer comment...)

[rachelmanija]

The first two books are basically exciting action sf set in a dystopian future - they're dark but not depressing.

Book three switches from handwringing about the underdogs to saying that the underdogs are just as bad as the oppressors, so (I take it) there's no point in doing anything.

[chomiji]

Interesting. I never read books that I know are super-depressing because, you know, real life has enough of those kind of moments almost every day in the news. But an awful lot of my younger friends seem to like this series. It makes me wonder whetehr this is some kind of an over-reaction to female-protagonist series where things are sweetness and light and marriage-plus-babies: instead, terrible things happen, and our heroine Endures! It's awesome!

>sigh<

It reminds me of when people would insist that I really, really ought to read Sheri Tepper. The few things I tried (The Family Tree and Beauty are the ones I recall) gave me the shudders for weeks afterward. Serious Themes do not necessarily equal Great Literature, especially when coupled with Wallowing in the Awfulness of It All.

[rachelmanija]

The first two books have a depressing premise, but play out as exciting action sf rather than Awesomely Depressing.

[thomasyan]

I propose a rule: When recommending Tepper, make sure to explicitly steer people away from Beauty as an early encounter unless you are fairly sure it would be appreciated. I did like that book, but geeze, that's not a good way to try out Tepper.

I really did like her Marianne books. I haven't yet read her Jinian or Mavin (same world?) fantasy books, but my impression is that they are fun, too. Whereas Beauty is grim and depressing with, for many people, a large helping of traumatic.

[rachelmanija]

The Jinian and Peter series are rather charming, set in a quirky D&D-ish world. I didn't like the Mavin books, and the last Jinian book has an ending which I hate very much (because it's stupid and creepy, not because it's depressing) but the first two Jinian books are still comfort re-reads.

I can't stand Beauty, and even if I did like it I wouldn't recommend it as a first Tepper. I like her fluffy fantasy way more than her serious books, with the exception of The Gate to Women's Country, which is completely preachy but also has all this great domestic detail and worldbuilding that I love.

[loligo]

My usual example separating inherently depressing from gratuitously depressing is a Holocaust novel in which everyone dies in a concentration camp, and a Holocaust novel in which everyone dies in a concentration camp except for the protagonist's true love, who is liberated, runs joyously across the street to meet her, and is squashed by a cement truck. Not only was the cement truck not a logical consequence of genocide, but by adding implausible elements to make genocide even more depressing, the entire novel and so the genocide it contains seem less real, and so defeats the author's purpose.

Well said!

[tavella]

Yeah, I read this (well, skimmed more after the first bit) because people had said good things about the series, and I kept thinking "this is the great, determined female lead everyone was talking about?"

[rachelmanija]

She's very determined in book one!