I am officially halfway through Midnight's Children, and it is finally about, a P-C put it so well, Indian kids with superpowers. I've found the language compelling throughout, but I'm finally getting really interested in the plot. And I love the whole way it is being told, with his constant interruptions by Padma and his tangents. I'm glad I picked this one up!

I went into a small bookstore last night to see if they had The Hunger Games because the corner of one of my pages was inexplicably torn out, and the guy had never heard of it. What, how can you work at a bookstore and not know The Hunger Games ?

Anyway, I just finished! Katniss is still totally awesome, although I am in some ways disappointed that she didn't KILL THEM ALL. I kind of expected the Games to go a different way, and it seemed like most of the tributes killed each other, leaving very little blood on her hands. I also thought we might get to know more of the tributes better so that we would care when they died, but not so much. There are a lot of ways you could tell this story, and although Collins didn't do it the way I thought she would, I still liked it, especially all the survivalist tactics (now I want Katniss to meet Cass from The Secret Series). I loved the fact that it was all a big snuff film reality show and the fact that the Gamemakers kept fucking with them to make it more entertaining.

I knew two things about this series: the basic concept of the Hunger Games (but not the details) and that there was some sort of love triangle that people cared about. I was excited about the former but dreaded the latter. But the way Collins played it is kind of awesome. It's not that two people pretend to be in love and then they really fall in love is an original concept, but the fact that it's so tied to their survival makes things really fucked-up. I don't want Katniss's conflicted feelings to get annoying, though. So far, they seem realistic enough. She's in a weird position, for sure. And because people had mentioned Peeta in later books, I knew he had to survive the Games too, and I thought it was going to be kind of a cheat, and I sort of rolled my eyes at the mid-Games rules change, but then near the end, I started to think it would be kind of awesome if they changed the rules back, and THEY DID, so it was less of a cheat, and in the denouement I saw that even though it seemed like not forcing Katniss to kill Peeta was the easy way out...Collins actually did pick the path that made things hardest for her characters.

The great thing now is that I have NO FUCKING CLUE what happens in the other two books. All I knew was there were Hunger Games. Now what? Is Katniss going to lead a new rebellion? Are there going to be lots of explosions? And is Gale going to get a fair shot at being her suitor? Poor everyone.

P-C, are you aware of Mark Reads the Hunger Games? He's unspoiled, and reads a chapter a day and posts his reactions and so forth. I'm actually loving reading it.

Speaking of Rushdie, I have 2 copies of the Satanic Verses in hardcover. Does anyone want my duplicate copy?

Ha ha ha ha, I have heard about it, but I hadn't seen it.

1) The Hunger Games are some sort of game and people die, but no one will die until book two.

2) The main character will get chosen for The Hunger Games.

3) There will be people.

4) Look, I don’t know.

I was a little more spoiled than he is, but I definitely get his perspective. Heh.

It's pretty cool to read his reactions paragraph by paragraph, actually!

WHAT THE HOLY FUCK. WHAT THE FUCK. Are you serious??? This is some Battle Royale shit right here, guys. Really????

Ha ha ha ha, I love that he really, seriously, DID NOT KNOW THIS about the book.

Also, we had the same reaction to the end of chapter one.

I really, really need to know what the Games are going to be like and I need to know now and this is all my fault because I agree to read things one chapter at a time.

I don't know how he is managing to do this!! Although by doing this, he's managed to pick up on a few details here and there that I missed.

I love how surprised he is at how fucked-up everything is. Hee. I will have to keep reading his reactions, for sure.

(Unlike him, I am fine with first-person present tense and, although I don't think it's exceptional, I am fine with Collins's prose.)

OMG, I'm #62 on the library hold list for Mockingjay. I always do this -- read older books from the library and then have to buy the later ones when I can't wait!

Jesse, Amazon has all the books on sale for over half price right now. That's how I bought them. Hardcover books at paperback prices!

I, too, am reading Mark Reads, and it's hilarious! (I wonder how much more I would pick up if I actually read shit slowly instead of being all "MUST KNOW WHAT HAPPENS NOW NOW NOW"). I keep laughing at the repeated "OMG SHIT IS GETTING REAL" comments from him. He has no idea how real shit will get.

JZ followed Mark Reads all through the Harry Potter books and it's pretty fun also as he hits the big HSQ moments.

(I wonder how much more I would pick up if I actually read shit slowly instead of being all "MUST KNOW WHAT HAPPENS NOW NOW NOW").

Yeah, I can't even remember where the second book ended. I might re-read it right now.