The Hunger Games

I love to read!  I read daily, but usually it takes me a while to finish books, since I don't have as much time as I would like to get into a book.  However, the benefits of being a teacher are that I get to read as much as I want to in the summer. 

The beginning of the summer found me struggling to get through a few books that I wanted to read, but had found difficult to get into.  However, that all changed as I took the next book off my "To Be Read" shelf in the office.  The book was The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins.  I had been hearing some talk about how good the book was and I had bought it back in April.  I thought "this is just a young adult novel, so how good can it be?"  However, that was the wrong assumption.  It was great. 

Many people will probably turn away from this book, because it is in the science fiction genre.  But, don't be mistaken.  The setting is only a distant backdrop to a world with amazing characters, exciting plots, and a twist-and-turn romance that will keep you flipping the pages in your book (or e-reader) with haste.  Find the synopsis and picture of the book below.

In the ruins of a place once known as North America lies the nation of Panem, a shining Capitol surrounded by twelve outlying districts. The Capitol is harsh and cruel and keeps the districts in line by forcing them all to send one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen to participate in the annual Hunger Games, a fight to the death on live TV. Sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen, who lives alone with her mother and younger sister, regards it as a death sentence when she is forced to represent her district in the Games. But Katniss has been close to dead before-and survival.