Calling for a redo

I was one of the fans of The Hunger Games who had anxiously awaited the final book of the series. It was the first book I actually preordered on Amazon. If this had been the first book in the series, I wouldn’t even have finished the book. The first 180 pages were boring! As I was reading it, I just kept thinking that I should skip to the last chapter to see how the love saga between Peeta, Katniss, and Gale was resolved and get on with my own life. My daughter who read it before I did, just kept telling me to make it to page 200, and it would get better. Halfway through and it finally gets better? She was right, but even now as I have finished the book, I am still frustrated. Suzanne Collins spends way too much time giving us a feel for what it is like to live in district 13. She spends almost half the book when a mere 25 pages would have been more than sufficient. And then I didn’t feel like the corruption she alludes to in 13 was adequately resolved after spending almost the entire first half on its bizarre policies. Peeta seems missing for too much of the book. I love Peeta! I wanted more Peeta. Gale didn’t seem this cold-hearted in any of the previous books. And Katniss just seems too lost. I know it was war, but too many of my favorites die. Many things I thought and hoped would be included in the book were written of only briefly because so much was written about district 13. I wanted more closure between Gale, Katniss, and Peeta, and to know more of rebuilding life after the fall of the capitol. I loved the last four pages. Yes, the last four pages were the best. The rest was just mediocre writing with a few clever twists mingled in. But now I can get on with my life!