The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes (A Hunger Games Novel) (The Hunger Games)

Ending felt rushed and sudden, but the book was well written and interesting. I enjoyed being put back into the world of Panem and learning about the background of the Hunger Games.

It's silly. I knew Snow would be the antagonist and how it would end - maybe not the specifics - but somehow I kept hoping for things to end well? Maybe I'd be surprised? Maybe I watch a few too many romcoms where the snobby rich dude meets a poor girl with a heart of gold and changes him. But nah. It was expected. And I enjoyed it for the most part.

Snow is a dick. I mean, we all know that, but seeing him even as a snot-nosed teenager makes it that much worse. He's self-centered, narcistic, and the epitome of just how out of touch the Capital citizens are with the rest of Panam's plight. He really tries hard to make you feel bad for him, comparing himself to rich people and seeing how well off they are, yet his true colors shown through when he constantly mentions old families vs new families. He might not be quite as spoiled as the other rich kids, but he's still a trust fund baby who will do anything to get what he wants, an unfortunate perfect rotten product of his upbringing.

And poor Lucy Gray deserved so much better. What the hell she ever saw in Snow, I'll never fathom. Yeah, he showed her some kindness and perhaps loved her in his own way, but why would she have ever fallen for him? How could she not detest the striking differences between how he viewed the world and how it really was? This relationship was doomed to fail from the start, even if Snow wasn't paranoid.

Such a good book, the imagery was great and really made me dislike young Snow with how she portrayed him so perfectly. He was portrayed so well as the charmer who has other motives and how the key points in the story made me really understand how young snow became the snow we see in the original trilogy.

i thought this would include more of the secrets of snow that are alluded to in the original series. still interesting and there’s some philosophical stuff about human nature. cool background, but it almost felt contrived how much he and katniss share? but idk maybe it’s just cool and makes sense i can’t decide yet.

i liked the beginning but wanted more to happen in the second half, before the fast forward at the end.

i didn’t like that the audiobook just spoke all the songs.

rating: 3.5 rounded up for now

I have never been more excited to be done with a book omg. The Easter eggs into the original trilogy were awesome, getting some background information on snow was great, but the pacing killed me. That along with the repetitiveness of EVERYTHING was driving me bonkers. The romance was also just a bit odd? I never really felt their connection and the fact that it was about 1/4 of the plot was not helping me finish this book.