I wasn’t expecting much, in all honesty. I thought that, though it has been a decade or more since I last read the series, The Hunger Games would be a great YA dystopian book with a strong nostalgia for a time in the past, but it wouldn’t be able to surpass its YA title to resonate with me as an adult reader now. Tell me why I rate The Hunger Games higher than I did as a teen. Tell me why the content of this book is so compelling and engaging and downright believable, palpable, and terrifying.

The narrative voice is perfect for such a book as this. Katniss is young, but she’s matured in ways that make her far more aware of the realities of life in District Twelve and how Panem functions. How the Capitol functions. There are still moments of naivety and limited knowledge, of course, as there should be with a sixteen-year-old character. Katniss has a quality to her, something in how she interacts with the world, that says so much more about her in the books than is portrayed on screen. The missing members of District Twelve, for example, shed light on her as a person, a daughter, and a friend. I had forgotten Madge, the Mayor’s daughter, and seeing her interactions with Katniss created this essence of Katniss that isn’t shown well in the film. Katniss’s interactions with Greasy Sae, Peeta’s dad, members of the district who trade with her and Gale, and even the relationship with her mother all provide an extra layer to who Katniss is as a person and make it feel more realistic that District Twelve would salute her in such a way after volunteering for Prim. They make the district feel less beaten down and conforming, which makes the idea of an uprising in the outer districts all the more believable.

But back to Katniss. Katniss has far more emotion and active thought in the books. I know that a written internal monologue is far easier to convey than an onscreen one, but there is far more to Katniss in the book than was ever depicted in the movie. Katniss is rough and a bit hotheaded at times, but she also has care and innocence. Katniss may not be able to see how others view her, especially those who love her, but she can pick up on the tools for survival – how she needs to act, what she needs to say, and what Haymitch is telling her by not sending her gifts in the arena. She can pick up on these things instantly, but what isn’t deemed essential to survival, she has gone blind to. This makes her perspective very interesting in the arena because she is in her element regarding hunting and using the landscape to her advantage. How she moves is natural, and she thinks no differently from her daily life back in twelve, but there is always the looming pressure to appeal to the Capitol and the sponsors.

And oh, how my heart sang at the continual fear characters have for the Capitol and what they could do to their loved ones. You know the political system and people in authority are powerful when, even after coming out of the Games alive, characters are still dead scared of stepping a toe out of line. There is no individual strength or success that will ever be enough to make a victor as powerful as President Snow and that supports the notion of an uprising being the only way forward even more, making it all the more believable that once people stop fearing the Capitol and fearing Snow they can topple the system. Again, the movie didn’t do this book justice because there are several moments in the novel that hammer home the repercussions of rebellion – Katniss’s immediate reaction to shooting the apple in the pig’s mouth during private testing, Rue explaining life in District Eleven and how brutal it is compared to District Twelve, Katniss and Haymitch’s fraught post-Games conversation under the stage. Without seeing or hearing the consequences of such acts, fear isn’t as effective a deterrent. Suzanne Collins makes you get an up close and personal look into what happens to those who try to beat the Capitol.

I am so excited and eager to continue rereading the series. I’m almost glad I waited this long because I don’t remember the differences between the films and the books. Seeing for myself how much more impactful the books are will be so gratifying, and I can honestly say that Suzanne Collins is an inspiration for creating such a complex and authentic world as Panem.