This morning, I remembered that when I wrote my book blog post the other day, I didn't mention that I'd read the last in the Huger Games trilogy, before I finished the last Lucia book and picked up Never Let Me Go. (So, if you haven't read The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, and Mockingjay, this probably won't be interesting for you... and there are spoilers, too. Beware!)
(No, seriously. There are **SPOILERS** down there. Just walk away now and nobody has to get hurt.)
I had been looking forward to the conclusion of the series, because I enjoyed the first two books-- especially the first. I didn't really know what to expect, but I didn't expect what it turned out to be. It wasn't necessarily a bad book, but it just felt... weak, somehow, and weakening.
Honestly, much of the book has already faded in my memory, but from what I recall, Mockingjay felt too, too dark. Yeah, I know it's about war. However, the first two books also dealt with dark subjects, but for whatever reason, they never felt utterly hopeless and despairing like this one did. It was like this: "DARK DARK DARKER *occasional spot in which Katniss is (annoyingly, inexplicably) Little Miss Perfect Heroine™*, and now back to your regularly scheduled DARK DARK DARKNESS."
Side note: Maybe I've forgotten something... but didn't it turn out that Katniss' attempt to get close enough to President Snow to kill him-- the decision to sneak into the heart of the city-- was... well, totally unnecessary? Argh! I mean, (again) yeah, sure, that's probably realistic. But that makes it even more frustrating that so many characters ended up killed during that "special operation". (And this is just one example of how irritating this book was to me.)
Even the conclusion, in which the romantic subplot is finally resolved, just doesn't feel like nearly enough. Maybe it's realistic, but it's a very sad reality... and it didn't feel in keeping with the beginning of the series. It was a let-down. It just fizzled. I felt that we readers (not to mention Katniss and Peeta) deserved something a little better than that.
Anyway, I suppose it's a good enough book for what it is-- thought-provoking, moving, and so on. It's just not one I'm clamoring to re-read.
