So I read the hunger games trilogy at 18/19 years old and devoured the books. I remember having all three read in less than a week and like hunger games the most because I liked the way the movie adaption added onto Katniss’s story.
Ten-ish years later I’m listening to The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes and it’s making me want to re-read the original trilogy because I feel like I’ll pick up so much more than I did that first go around. The prequel is interesting in a stomach turning way because we are seeing the true way the capital views the districts. It’s interesting because Snow’s thoughts and his actions often conflict. He’s so good at pretending to be a decent person, at portraying someone good and wholesome and just when in reality it is all smoke and mirrors. I get how Lucy Gray can fall in love with the man/boy that saw her as a person, as a lady (or at least treated like that) when everyone else was treating her like an animal, no they were treating her as if she was less than an animal. I get why Serjanus thinks Snow is his friend because he defends him and helps him over and over. Sure we, the reader (or in my case the listener) know that Snow despises Serjanus and views Lucy Gray as a possession. We know he’s got no respect for either of them and that everything he is doing is to push a narrative, to push an image that he’s spent years crafting.
It’s brilliantly twisted to be inside Snow’s head to see the way he came up with or at least was part of the group that helped turn the Hunger Games into what they were in Katniss’s time. He was crucial to their continuation. And I’m only about a third of the way through the book, so I can’t wait to see where it goes.
So I finished the book… yesterday and I have so many feelings.
1. Snow’s cruelty knows no bounds. He may have cared about Serjanus after he died (and I do feel he was actually devastated to lose him for a minute) but his conniving ways were stronger because he saw a way to steal his life for himself and grabbed it with both hands.
2. I know people say that he love Tigris but I don’t agree because he very much treated her as a servant, who’s job it was to cook and clean and support him without him giving the same love and affection back. I can understand how he would so easily discard her later. She truly cared about him (and the Grandma’am) but that care was not returned. Eight years old and being forced to learn to cook and clean bc your guardian will not do so??? Even as she brags about the greatness of your cousin??? It’s weird and twisted.
3. Grandma’am’s treatment of Ma bothered me so much. She’s not your effing maid. She’s not your servant. Honestly the Grandma’am’s attitude toward the district bothered me so much. She’s was such a bigoted old lady… Snow really took after her. I don’t get how Tigris grew up so well but I half think it’s because she was viewed more as a servant than as family.
4. Finding out about the start of the games and the hell Dean highbottom experienced constantly because of an assignment that he hadn’t meant to see the light of day. Thinking about all the ways that Snow used the games as a punishment, as a way to hurt and control, it’s so twisted… especially after learning that his father was the person that pushed them to happen.
5. The fact that Snow was always forgetting the last C, contract- as in the social contract between a society and the government that leads, guides and protects them was interesting af to me. It’s easy to see that his focus on control and punishment made him disregard the duty owed to people. Especially because he felt that people are cruel and murderous at their core… something he was because of how twisted a person he was.
So I read the hunger games trilogy at 18/19 years old and devoured the books. I remember having all three read in less than a week and like hunger games the most because I liked the way the movie adaption added onto Katniss’s story.
Ten-ish years later I’m listening to The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes and it’s making me want to re-read the original trilogy because I feel like I’ll pick up so much more than I did that first go around. The prequel is interesting in a stomach turning way because we are seeing the true way the capital views the districts. It’s interesting because Snow’s thoughts and his actions often conflict. He’s so good at pretending to be a decent person, at portraying someone good and wholesome and just when in reality it is all smoke and mirrors. I get how Lucy Gray can fall in love with the man/boy that saw her as a person, as a lady (or at least treated like that) when everyone else was treating her like an animal, no they were treating her as if she was less than an animal. I get why Serjanus thinks Snow is his friend because he defends him and helps him over and over. Sure we, the reader (or in my case the listener) know that Snow despises Serjanus and views Lucy Gray as a possession. We know he’s got no respect for either of them and that everything he is doing is to push a narrative, to push an image that he’s spent years crafting.
It’s brilliantly twisted to be inside Snow’s head to see the way he came up with or at least was part of the group that helped turn the Hunger Games into what they were in Katniss’s time. He was crucial to their continuation. And I’m only about a third of the way through the book, so I can’t wait to see where it goes.
I just finished reading The ballad of songbirds and snakes. IM NOT OKAY.
Anyways here is a little revieuw or whatever
⚠️SPOILERS AHEAD⚠️
This book was so good. In the beginning I had some trouble to get into the story, but soon I was in love with the story. I loved Lucy Gray’s character immidiatly. I loved the story. It was such an emotional rollercoaster. I was sure Lucy Gray was gonna die, and so I was very happy to see her win the Hunger Games.
After the Hunger Games, I was very confused. There where so many pages left?? What could possibly be on those pages?? Well, it was a giant plottwist. I did not expect Coriolanus to have to go to District 12, and I was very confused. When Sejanus showed up at the peacekeeper base I got very happy, cuz I love his character. And then, the reunion between Lucy Gray and Coriolanus. I love their relationship (or at least what it was at that moment) and I was very happy to see them reunited.
THEN.
I WAS SO HEARTBROKEN WHEN SEJANUS DIED. IT WAS NOT FAIR. AND THE FACT THAT HIS LAST WORDS WERE “MA!” IS EVEN SADDER. AND THAT LUCY GRAY AND CORIOLANUS WERE WATCHING AND EVERYTHING AND- AAAH.
Then it became very confusing (again). I have no idea who was good and who was bad in the end. Did Lucy Gray betray Coriolanus? Or did she flee, scared of what he had done? I have no idea.
Also the true meaning of the hanging tree song is so sad aaaah
ANYWAYSSSS I REALLY ENJOYED IT OT WAS AN AWESOME BOOK AMD I REALLY RECOMMEND IT !
I visited the local AAUW Used Book Sale where I bought 21 books! I divided my haul into 3 parts, so here are the last 7 books!
Pictured from top to bottom: Catherine House by Elisabeth Thomas, The Ravens by Kass Morgan and Danielle Paige, My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh, Magic for Liars by Sarah Gailey, The Inexplicable Logic of my Life by Benjamin Alire Sáenz, The Lost Hero by Rick Riordan, and The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins.
i am once again thinking about how suzanne collins went back to her 10 year old series to publish a prequel to say “just in case it wasn’t clear. you are the capitol. you are not from district 12, you are not the uprising. you are sitting in your house, enjoying a level of wealth unimaginable to billions, and you are watching the hunger games for your entertainment. you are reveling in it, all its violence and romance, and you got caught up in it and its characters. but this story is about you. i am stripping away the entertainment and the characters and the distraction because this story is about your horror and and complete and total lack of empathy and perspective. that is what it has always been about. look at it.” and some people still don’t get it. anyway very iconic of her
At the dawn of the reaping, ambitious 18-year-old Coriolanus Snow has a realization: he only has one shot to save his family from destitution and earn eternal glory, and that shot revolves around the victor he’s assigned to mentor in the tenth annual Hunger Games.
The odds are against him - he must mentor the doomed female tribute, Lucy Gray, from District 12, the lowest of the low. What starts as a humiliating assignment quickly turns as his tribute begins surprising them all. Coriolanus and Lucy Gray will need to outcharm, outwit, and outmaneuver everyone around them - inside and outside the arena - to triumph. But winning has its price.
Set more than 60 years before we meet Katniss Everdeen, The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is the terrifying prequel to The Hunger Games series you didn’t know you needed. Check out this heart pounding MCTBA nominee today!
I’ve read the book so fast that I’m not sure I remember a half of it lol. I was so excited! And now I got my English language copy so I need to find time to read it properly. I love “the ballad” and I love all the songs and all new information about Panem. Ah, and Snow lands on top, obviously ;)
1. i just KNEW sejanus wasnt gonna make it from the minute we met him based on how we already know what the capitol does to people it deems are rebels which he clearly was… but it still hurted tho
2. the whole time that dr. gaul was trying to “teach” snow why they do the hunger games i was waiting for him to talk about providing “hope” to the districts since that was what he talked to katniss about and i thought is what he used to justify the games
3. i ~like the theory that maude ivory is katniss’s grandma but i feel like if she was she def would have known who lucy gray baird was and that she was the victor of the 10th hunger games but maybe thats just me
overall 13/10 book and while not a super action based read it was still one of the best books ive ever read
okay but maude ivory could’ve decided to never utter lucy gray’s name to her descendants because she remembered lucy gray and the peacemaker who followed her to district 12. she could’ve connected lucy gray’s disappearance to snow’s gradual rise in power. she remembered how lucy gray’s name was called at the reaping because the mayor held a grudge against her. imagine if her children ran around talking about a girl the capitol swore to forget about. it would’ve been considered an act of rebellion and a sure way to get her family killed. if she is katniss’ grandmother she could’ve made sure nobody remembered lucy gray but allowed her music to live on as her legacy
It’s been said before, but I am all for the idea that, to Snow, Katniss Everdeen was Lucy Gray Baird rising up from the dead to haunt him.
This small, dark-haired Seam girl, making a scene at the reaping. Drawing the Capitol’s attention in the parade, and in the interviews, and with her training score. Haunted by tragic love as she enters the arena. Singing to Rue as she dies, and adorning her body with a rainbow of flowers. Cheating the Games to bring her and Peeta out alive.
And then - unwillingly - figureheading a revolution. Being hailed the mockingjay - the very thing that Snow so hated, that he so passionately wanted destroyed. Refusing to relinquish her own agency, refusing to play the Capitol’s game by its rules. Singing The Hanging Tree, by the lake.Dancing with Prim at Finnick and Annie’s wedding, spinning around the room to folk music.
It must have felt, to Snow, like Lucy Gray (and a little of Sejanus) reincarnated - Lucy Gray, coming to haunt him. Coming to destroy his empire from beyond the grave. Taking her revenge, after all those years.
Me reading TBOSAS and wondering how Coriolanus Snow, a relatively decent young man who doesn’t like authority or even the Hunger Games, who likes music and love and family, becomes a bloodthirsty tyrannical fucklord???
Finally starting to read The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes and I’m already getting emotionally attached to Coriolanus and Lucy Gray and Sejanus Why do I have a feeling this is not going to end well for any of them
