DragonFlight -- Final Thoughts (Part 2)

Walle:
I enjoyed the book a lot, because it was very interesting. Even though it used stuff like dragons, and mythological creatures that we know about, I think she gave it her own twist. It was pretty unique. I liked the entire idea of the threads. The way she used the little details.

Dande:
This time around reading it, I didn't like it as much, but I still liked it and I still like so many things about it. I have such a soft spot in my heart for Pern, the world, and all the stories there. I obviously enjoyed it and it's obvious—I obviously—

Newhope:
It's obvious.

[laughs]

Newhope:
You don't have to say anything.

Dande:
I would recommend this book, and obviously I have—[she cracks up]

Smiley:
No, no, don't be self-conscious.

Dande:
No, I'm freaking out about the obvious thing. Wvskier: said "obviously."

Newhope:
What? No, she didn't.

[laughs]

Wvskier:
You're trying to put the blame on me?

Newhope:
Obviously!

[laughs]

Dande:
Okay! I love the world, and it's one of my favorite series. I mean, I have a lot of favorites, but it's definitely up there, and I think that's it's just really good fantasy.

Wvskier:
Even though it's old.

Dande:
Even though it's old, yeah. Well, it's forty years old.

Newhope:
It's really, really old.

Walle:
Oh, wow, I didn't realize.

Dande:
So . . . are we done?

Wvskier:
The only thing I have to say is that as soon as you get through the first book it gets a lot better.

Jolly:
Well, I would hope so.

Dande:
Keep reading.

DragonFlight -- Final Thoughts (Part 1)

Dande:
So I think we should go around and have final thoughts.

Newhope:
In general, the book was okay. It had a shaky start, but it had great plot twists, in my opinion. I really liked where it went with the whole book, where it started out being with the one plot, and it switched completely, and it ended up being a book where I actually enjoyed it. I actually wanted to find out what happened at the end. It left it off to a sequel, and I know how many books there are that have been written for it, and I enjoyed the ending.

Jolly:
I read ten pages, and I was confused.

[laughs]

Jolly:
I have no idea what you guys have been saying this entire time.

Lasagna:
Me too.

Chair:
I didn't read any of it.

Smiley:
Well, I—I don't know. Like I said, I read it really fast, and I haven't read the end yet, so I don't know if it's going to be really good at the end, but I agree with Newhope: the beginning was really not inviting to read the entire novel, and the middle was kind of boring.

[laughs]

Smiley:
But maybe if I read the end, and maybe if I read it slower and at my own pace, I will like it. But I did like the plot, and I did like the whole between times thing, even though I didn't get the between thing until later on. It was a good book.

Wvskier:
I obviously love the series. I actually find her writing style very similar to J. R. R. Tolkien's. Basically it sort of draws out, not the boring stuff, but the stuff you wouldn't really read about, not the action.

Newhope:
Like J. R. R. Tolkien's description of the darkness of a cave that goes on for pages . . .

Wvskier:
It basically shows the minor things in the book, and I find that pretty interesting, because basically you don't normally read about every single little detail. And that's what I like about her, basically.

DragonFlight -- Bloopers: When You're Not in The Room

[Dande,blogmaster, recorder, and transcriber extraordinaire, is about to leave the room to find a wayward book clubber.]

Dande:
You know, the last time I left for a little bit too, and I got to hear your whole conversation when I was gone, when I was listening to the tape. Just so you know.

[laughs]

Dande:
You guys were good. You didn't say anything mean or anything.

Jolly:
That you know of . . .

Dande:
I have good friends! Okay, I'll leave now.

[she leaves]

Chair:
Dande's gone! Party!

[laughs]

Smiley:
She does realize we can turn it off and say things about her that she doesn't know . . .

Newhope:
Well, she realizes it now!

[laughs]

Newhope:
No, I don't want to touch it, because I don't want to accidentally erase anything.

Smiley:
Just kidding, Dande!

DragonFlight -- The Rest of the Series (Part 2)

Dande:
Overall, I liked it. I mean, there were problems with it, but there are so many books that have problems like that and it is so boring it is not worth it. But I think this book was worth it, especially since it is the start of such a great series.

Newhope:
I really like the whole time thing. I did not know that the plot would revolve around time travel like that.

Walle:
Sometimes it felt like the book is not really supposed to be a book. It's just a set up for books to follow.

Smiley:
Like a prologue-book.

Walle:
And then every time we would talk about something it's like, "It's explained in a later book! It's explained in a later book!"

Dande:
I just made this up in my head, but I could imagine that the author knew about this whole world, and this is just the introduction.

Smiley:
Maybe she wanted it to go slow. Compared to The Hunger Games, this went by really slow. Like Newhope said, in the middle it was really dull. Maybe that's just because she wanted it to be slow.

Dande:
I think that certain things about the book would have been lost if she—

Smiley:
Went faster?

Dande:
Yeah, you definitely did feel that it was a world.

DragonFlight -- The Between, The End, & A Paradox

Newhope:
A massive plot hole to me was the between. They never explained the between.

Smiley:
Yeah, they never did.

Newhope:
I felt like they just made it up because they wanted something to guide the story along.

Wvskier:
The between is nothing. In one of the other books they go on with that.

* * *

Dande:
I thought that that was such a cool way to end it and tie it all together, that solution that they found. I thought that was unique. I didn't see it coming at all, that they'd go back and bring the Weyrs forward.

Newhope:
I did not know that the book would go back in time.

Smiley:
I did like that too, how she mentioned things in the beginning of the book and how it affected things later in the end. Like, the between time thing? I knew that was coming, I knew they would go to the south continent.

Newhope:
But the going back four hundred years thing is what you don't predict. I'm kinda wondering how that cycle started. If you think about it, it has to start somewhere. It makes sense that she goes back in time because they're not there, but it's a circle.

Dande:
It's a paradox.

Newhope:
It can't happen!

Dande:
It doesn't matter!

Newhope:
They should have been there, they should have had no need to go back. That's why I'm like, "Oh, wow, that hurts."

Wvskier:
Well, I think why they went back—yes, it is a paradox—but one of the main things, I guess the reason why they did that, is that over the four hundred years, since there are so many doubts, maybe all five Weyrs would have diminished. So bringing forward four Weyrs all trained in fighting the Thread would help with this current Pass.

DragonFlight -- Lessa and F’lar & Power

Dande:
When you're talking about Lessa and F'lar—I remember when I first read it, I was totally into it and everything. But when I was rereading it, I just didn't get their relationship at all.

Smiley:
Yeah, it was somewhat weird. There was this part in the middle of the novel when they were having dinner together or whatever, and—I kind of didn't get it, in the beginning. Are they together, or are they not? Do they like each other?

Walle:
It felt like they were forced together because of their dragons.

Dande:
It's amazing, because I remembered it making so much sense— laughs

Dande:
—but as I was reading it, it was like, what in the world is going on here? The characters, I got them as individual characters, but how they related to each other followed no logic whatsoever. No development at all.

Wvskier:
Their relationship is sort of tough in the beginning, because they both obviously have a station of power, and they both want to control each other. That's sort of how they come together, because they understand that with each other they can become more powerful than when they're separate.

Dande:
I mean, she's riding the golden dragon, the most important dragon in the Weyr, but the person that her dragon mates with is the leader of the Weyr? How does that make any sense? It was written in 1968, so I guess feminism wasn't important then? Maybe that was part of it. There were just a lot of things that seemed strange to me.

Walle:
I didn't understand whether Weyrwoman or Weyrleader was the higher post.

Dande:
Exactly!

Wvskier:
Weyrleader is the highest. It's sort of like, not dictator—

[laughs]

Wvskier:
—but he basically is the president.

Newhope:
It's a monarchy.

Dande:
Well, if you put it in that way, it makes more sense to me. I guess I can't really compare it to this world and what makes sense here.

DragonFlight -- Firestone & Games

Dande:
But what things did people like about the book?

Smiley:
I liked the plot. The storyline was definitely good. I know dragons are very repetitive in fantasy, but I thought the storyline was somewhat unique.

Dande:
Yeah, and she definitely was pioneering a lot of those dragon things that we think of as so cliché now, but she was the first.

Walle:
I liked the fact that her dragons weren't usual mythological dragons. Like, with the entire eye thing, she tried to go for something different, so I liked that a lot.

Dande:
I remember when first read it being so interested by the fact that they couldn't just breathe fire, they had to eat rock and belch out fire.

Newhope:
I'm wondering how they learned that.

Dande:
Well, it's explained in later books.

Newhope:
That's what I would expect.

Wvskier:
It was genetically engineered.

* * *

Dande:
I did like the fact that she explained—there are little things in the book that explain questions I hadn't even asked yet. Like the thing about how they do the games. They never really even focus on it or talk about it, but then you get it. "Oh, they must do those game things every year to keep the dragons in shape between two Passes!"

Newhope:
Practice.

Dande:
Yeah, keep them practicing, keep them still able to fly and do maneuvers and stuff. They must have invented that just to keep them doing stuff. And then people got into it, I guess, and made it important.

Walle:
It said that some dragon died because of firestone. Does that mean that they feed them firestone in the games?

Newhope:
Yes.

Walle:
But isn't that dangerous?

Newhope:
Yes.

[laughs]

Wvskier:
It is, but it keeps them trained, even though they don't understand it at this point.

Newhope:
During a Thread attack shouldn't be the first time they try it out.

Walle:
But breathing flame at each other?

Wvskier:
That was an accident.

Walle:
Oh, okay. I was scared. I was like, "Do they want to kill each other?"

DragonFlight -- Thrown In & Style (Part 1)

Lasagna:
I don't think I read far enough into this to actually get anything, because this is one of those books where they just throw you right into it, and you have to think for a little bit about what it's talking about and then you'll understand it. I just didn't really get it.

Dande:

When I was reading it recently to reread it, it was different for me because—while I knew that all these cool, interesting, great things came later, and so I kept reading, but I was thinking that if I just started reading this book now, I probably wouldn't keep reading through it. The beginning would have totally turned me off. I must have been a more open reader five years ago when I read it for the first time.

Smiley:
In the beginning, you know when Fax, F'lar—I always say flare when I'm reading it, but I know it's F'lar—Fax, F'lar, and F'nor, you know when they're all talking, and after they say one sentence, it's like, "Oh, he directed this insult at him. Oh, he said it like this." That was kind of annoying to me to get past. If they said it once, "they said it insultingly," then OK, I get it. But they kept mentioning it throughout the whole dialog. "Oh, he said it like this, which was so insulting. Oh, he said it like that, which was so OhMyGosh."


[laughs]


Smiley:
It was annoying, in a way.

Wvskier:

In later books, she actually sort of changes her style. She doesn't do that as much, and she actually has the dragons talk directly.

Dande:
Yeah, I'm not sure if this was her first book overall, but it was definitely her first book in this whole series that lasted thirty years. So we could cut her some slack, maybe.

Smiley:

I don't think I was able to enjoy it as much because I was trying to read by today as a deadline.

Dande:
I gave it to you last week!

Smiley:

But I haven't read it since, like, today!

DragonFlight -- First Impressions & Terms (Part 2)

Dande:

Also, it was supposed to be a medieval culture—how were they so advanced to figure out a year is a Turn [and call it that]? We didn't figure that out until a couple hundred years ago.

Smiley:

Maybe they were smart.

Lasagna:

Didn't they come from Earth, or something? But they didn't know [it]?

Wvskier:

Well, they lost their technology over the years. Right now, there's no electricity or anything. They lost it because they don't have a fuel source.

Dande:

If you read the rest of the series, they were colonists that—

Lasagna:

It says that in the beginning of the book.

Dande:

It does?

Lasagna:

Yeah, it says something about how they came from Earth but they don't remember it.

Wvskier:

Now it's two thousand years later.

Walle:

They came here? Oh—I thought this was a completely different planet which developed humanity.

Dande:

No. Well, it's supposed to like that, in this book. This book is a fantasy book, and that's what fantasy books are: humans in a different world where they never were anywhere else. The series starts out as fantasy, and then it morphs into science fiction at the end.

* * *

Newhope:

What did you think about the different terms that meant the same thing, such as "Turn" and "year."

Smiley:

Yeah, yeah!

Newhope:

They said "year." So I'm like, "Then what's a Turn?"

Smiley:

Yeah, I was so confused. I'm like, "Is Turn their year?" But then they say "year."

Walle:

In the beginning, I thought a Turn was a day, because a turn is a rotation.

Smiley:

Yeah, I thought it was a cycle.

DragonFlight -- First Impressions & Terms (Part 1)

Dande:

Welcome to the second formal meeting of the Morris YA Book Club!

Smiley:

How many people have actually finished reading the book?

[about half]

Dande:

It's a good thing Wvskier is here, since she's read the whole series. I've read a lot of the books, but not all of them. I never tried to systematically go through them or anything. I just read the ones that were at the library.

Wvskier:

I have the six directly related to the Weyrs.

Smiley:

Do you want to begin?

Dande:

First impressions?

Walle:

I think that the author's writing style was a bit different. Sometimes, I had to read the sentences over again, because when you read it the first time I thought it was a fragment or something, and then I had to go back, and search . . .

Dande:

Well I noticed a couple that were fragments—but I think it was definitely different. I think it was partly because it was written so long ago that they had a different writing style back then. 

Walle:

Sometimes they used very hard words.

[laughs]

Newhope:

The vocabulary I didn't very much like—how they kept introducing terms but didn't really explain them.

DragonFlight by Anne McCaffrey

Dande here! This month the focus of this blog will be DragonFlight by Anne McCaffrey. DragonFlight was published in 1968 and is the first book in The Dragonriders of Pern series. The epic series contains almost two dozen books that take place at various times in the history of the planet Pern.

Overall, we enjoyed our DragonFlight meeting, but we intend to pick more recent books to read in the future, if only so that there will not be such an imbalance between those who have read later books and those who have not.

Our discussion revolved around a few key things: the dragging middle, the unique solution at the end, and the fact that many of our questions about the world would be explained later in the series. The two attendees who had read other books in the series agreed that the quality of the series improves as it goes on. We hope you enjoy eavesdropping on our discussion and contributing your own thoughts in the comments!

The schedule for DragonFlight posts is as follows:

• Wednesday, July 28th, 2010 -- First Impressions & Terms (Part 1)
• Thursday, July 29th, 2010 -- First Impressions & Terms (Part 2)
• Friday, July 30th, 2010 -- Thrown In & Style (Part 1)
• Monday, August 2nd, 2010 -- Thrown In & Style (Part 2) & Threadfall
• Tuesday, August 3rd, 2010 -- Firestone & Games
• Wednesday, August 4th, 2010 -- Middle Muddle (Part 1)
• Thursday, August 5th, 2010 -- Middle Muddle (Part 2)
• Friday, August 6th, 2010 -- Lessa and F'lar & Power
• Monday, August 9th, 2010 -- Thread & Title
• Tuesday, August 10th, 2010 -- Colors & Eggs
• Wednesday, August 11th, 2010 -- Politics (Part 1)
• Thursday, August 12th, 2010 -- Politics (Part 2) & Population Control
• Friday, August 13th, 2010 -- The Between, The End, & A Paradox
• Monday, August 16th, 2010 -- The Rest of the Series (Part 1)
• Tuesday, August 17th, 2010 --- The Rest of the Series (Part 2)
• Wednesday, August 18th, 2010 -- Bloopers: When You're Not in The Room
• Thursday, August 19th, 2010 -- Final Thoughts (Part 1)
• Friday, August 20th, 2010 -- Final Thoughts (Part 2)

At this meeting: Newhope, Dande, Walle, Wvskier, Smiley, Chair, Lasagna, Jolly

The Next Book: Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins

The Hunger Games-- One Last Comment from Everyone

Dande:
I really liked it. Like any book, it was good at some things and bad at others, and the stuff that I think it was really good at was that it really threw me in there, and while I was reading it I couldn't put it down. And it seemed definitely realistic, I really could believe I was there.

Newhope:
It made me hungry.

Walle:
I liked this book a lot, mostly because it was completely different than what I expected. It sort of opened up my mind.

Windex:
I thought this book was really good, because of all the action and stuff, but I felt like the romance just kept going on and on and on and on...

Smiley:
I really liked this book too, but I don't know, I thought the romance wasn't that bad. But the romance made me so sad because I knew that Peeta really did like her, I just could tell, and I knew that she didn't. It was just so sad at the end.

O'Juice:
Yeah, I kind of agree with Smiley. The instant that they were interviewing the people and he said, "Oh, and I brought that girl with me who I've always liked." I knew that was real.

Dande:
When he did that, and then they had the chapter break to the next section, I was thinking, "Oh, no she didn't!"

Laughs

O'Juice:
Okay, so I think this book might end up being one of my favorite series, and it's really awesome. The romance... it was good, but it would probably be better if it was actually real. She was faking it, so there was nothing there. It was just, "I'll give you a kiss, and now I'm going to get food."

Chair:
Personally, I think it was almost violent enough for me to forgive that scene where he takes off all his clothes, when she's pulling him out of the riverbank.

Laughs

Smiley:
Not all...

Jolly:
I really liked it, there was enough romance where I can deal with it, but it wasn't Twilight. There was enough action to keep me in the book.

O'Juice:
It wasn't like love at first sight or something. I hate those kinds.

Jolly:
Yes, thank you. Love at first sight is shallow.

Newhope:
This story actually had a progression to it. I liked it a lot, it had highs and lows, it had peaks where it was really exciting, and then downtime to build up to being even more exciting. Except for the ending, it ended without that peak.

The Hunger Games-- "Gale vs. Peeta" (Part 2)

Jolly:
I think they should have told us more about Gale.

Dande:
Gale seemed weird to me, they talked about this character and then-

Newhope:
-they offered nothing more on him at all.

Chair:
Yeah they kind of abandoned him after Chapter 2.

Jolly:
He's just her hunting partner, that's all we know about him.

Newhope:
He's just a plot device.

Chair:
Pretty much. They just kind of dropped him and then referred to him for the rest of the book.

Dande:
I think he's going to be a big deal in the next book, because that's where they're going, and so they have to include him here for him to be a big deal in the next book.

Chair:
I don't know, he seemed more like someone to refer to, like when she lost her hearing, like: I lost my hearing! If only Gale was here... I don't have any weapons! If only Gale was here... Peeta's not here! If only Gale was here.

Laughs

Dande:
Yeah, like an easy thing to say. She misses home, and we have to prove that she misses home, so, let's have her miss Gale!

Chair:
We need a character who is at home-

Dande:
Why couldn't it just be her sister?

Chair:
Because her sister's useless.

Newhope:
Maybe Gale's something to compare to... when Peeta moves through the woods, he goes so loudly, compared to Gale's moving silently.

* * *

Dande:
They try to set up this thing between Gale and Peeta for the next book, but they don't give us any reason to care about Gale. They say she cares about Gale, but I don't see any reason to care about Gale, Gale doesn't at all awesome to me. But Peeta, on the otherhand, he saves her a million times.

Chair:
But Gale is taking care of her family.

Jolly:
Until Peeta told his story about the first day he saw her, I didn't like Peeta at all, I liked Gale better. I liked Gale from the first minute they had him. I wanted him to end up in the Hunger Games just so that he could get to know her.

O'Juice:
Same here! I thought he would volunteer in place of Peeta or something.

Jolly:
I liked him better because he could hunt and survive.

Smiley:
I wouldn't have wanted Gale to come, because then the plot would be so much more-

Jolly:
I just wanted him to go so we found out more about him.

Dande:
I feel bad for him to have to watch this on TV. To watch what they were doing.

O'Juice:
She's always thinking, "I wonder what Gale is thinking right now..."

Jolly:
"I wonder what Gale thinks about all the kissing..."

Chair:
I wonder if you could concentrate on the people who are hunting you down as think about this!

* * *

Chair:
This is good now, but once the whole Gale vs. Peeta thing comes up, this could become Twilight way too fast.

Mixed squeals of glee and boos of horror

Jolly:
There will at least be a subplot of action and of them revolting against the Capitol.

The Hunger Games-- "Gale vs. Peeta" (Part 1)

Dande:
So what'd you guys think of Katniss and Peeta, that whole thing?

Smiley:
I felt so bad for Peeta.

Chair:
Sleeping medicine!

Laughs

Jolly:
That was funny, it's like-

Chair:
"Good night!"

Jolly:
"I'm not going to let you go off and try to save my life. No, you're stuck here with me."

Chair:
"Here, have some of this!" "Oh, what's this...? zzzzz......"

Jolly:
He's yelling at her and then he falls unconscious.

* * *

Dande:
At the end, I got so mad at Katniss for being unsure. "Do I love Peeta? Do I not? Or should I just fake it?"

Jolly:
I got really mad at Peeta for being mad at her. He just overreacted.

O'Juice:
I thought he would know. I thought he knew all along that she was acting.

Smiley:
I knew he didn't know.

Jolly:
I knew he didn't know after the Games ended. I'm pretty sure he knew during the Games, but after the games ended I'm pretty sure he thought she was totally being real.

Chair:
I don't know, because Katniss knew that when romantic stuff happened, Haymitch would send in more food-

Jolly:
1 kiss = a pot of broth.

Chair:
But Peeta didn't realize that. He just lay in the cave, dying, like, "Still here... any more food yet?"

Laughs

Walle:
About Katniss, I think Katniss also thought that Peeta was faking it. I don't understand how she didn't realize that he actually loved her.

Smiley:
I don't think she wanted to believe that.

O'Juice:
I think she actually likes Gale though. I have a feeling, when she comes back-

Jolly:
I know. I kept expecting that to happen, that's going to be a subplot, there's going to be a mini-war between Gale and Peeta for Katniss.

Smiley:
Twilight series!

Jolly:
Pretty much. That's going to be the plot of the next book. There's going to be the rebellion, but there's also going to be Peeta vs. Gale for Katniss. I think that was the whole reason for the, "We could run away, and make lives in the forest, if we didn't have so many kids..."

Walle:
I also think that, when he's shouting, "Remember, I-" and then he got cut off-

O'Juice:
Yeah, when they were leaving, and he said that and then they shut the door behind him. I thought he was going to say, "I love you, don't leave me!" or something.

The Hunger Games-- The Ending

[Editor's Note* The first part of this is from the very beginning of the meeting, and this was the first thing everyone had on their minds.]

Dande:
So welcome to the Morris Young Adult Book Club... so what did you guys think about the book?

Chair:
Jolly, go right ahead-

Jolly:
It had no ending...

O'Juice:
I hated the ending.

Chorus of agreement.

Windex:
Is this a series?

Newhope:
Well the book says end of book one...

Dande:
There are two more books.

O'Juice:
But is it like all about the same person?

Newhope:
It better be...

Jolly:
The next one comes out September 1st.

Dande:
I get that you have to set up for the series, but that kind of thing gets me mad. You have to have some sort of conclusion.

Newhope:
Closure.

Dande:
I'm still going to get the next book, because I want to know what happens, but... * frowns*

Jolly:
There's no ending, okay? They're holding hands, and they're about to step off the train. That's it.
End of Book 1. That's not an ending.

Walle:
I think they should have at least shown how the crowd reacted, just for a second. A brief flash of Gales face-

O'Juice:
Then if they ended with the sentence, "And then I saw Gale," that would kinda be a little bit-

Smiley:
That'd be really worse!

Jolly:
They should have just ended it after Peeta got mad at Katniss. It should have been, she's just standing there, and he's storming back to the train.

Dande:
I don't know what the author could have done... you guys are saying to just add a couple sentences, but I think it's just the way that the story is made. The story is made for there to be a whole bunch of stuff that happens latter but she didn't want to have a book this thick- *pantomimes thick book*

Jolly:
She should've.

Dande:
-so she had to chop it off right in the middle. And I guess, probably, she likes it because people will be like, "Oh, what's going to happen?" and buy the next one, but it's annoying.

O'Juice:
I want to smack her.

Laughs

Dande:
I think that because she had to cut it off in a horrible place, I think it almost would have been better if she just cut it off after they start going home, after the interview drama thing, and not even introduced the Peeta thing.

O'Juice:
I feel like she just took a knife and chopped it wherever she felt like it.

Chair:
It would have been good if they go on the hovercraft and it ended there. If they didn't even go into all the preparation: her ear's fixed, he's got a new leg.

Dande:
But they have to have that extra drama, about: oh my god are they going to attack them for the berry rebellion thing?

O'Juice:
I've never read another book with an ending that makes me want to read the next book so bad.

Dande:
I have.

Smiley:
It's called a cliffhanger...

Dande:
No, cliffhangers are good for the ends of chapters, not the ends of books. When authors do it at the end of books, it's just mean.

The Hunger Games-- Berries (Part 2)

Dande:
What did you guys think of the whole berry thing, at the end?

Laughs

Chair:
Oh, that was funny.

Newhope:
I'm pretty sure the Gamemakers were feeling pretty stupid right then.

Chair:
It's like, you're the smartest person in the Games?!?

O'Juice:
To me, that was a bit like... are you serious? That's so stupid, that's so soap opera right there.

Dande:
But it was smart too! That's the whole thing, a soap opera, but that's why they won, because the Games are supposed to be a soap opera or something.

Smiley:
But why do the Games need a winner?

O'Juice:
They don't want it to be like they're just having Games so they can kill all these children-

Smiley:
But that's what they do! It makes no sense!

Newhope:
The Capitol should have just killed Peeta off right then.

Chair:
See, what they were doing though, is they wanted to make it the big dramatic fight between the two star-crossed lovers, see which one of them kills each other, and if all else fails, declare them both winners so we have one.

Dande:
They needed to have a winner because if they didn't have a winner everyone would get all upset and angry and revolt! But... who cares if they revolt? They can just kill them. I guess maybe they didn't want them to revolt because then they'd loose money, because they wouldn't be working...

Walle:
But I don't think the people in the districts would revolt, I think the actual population of the Capitol would revolt, because they would say it wasn't fair. Because even though this is entertainment I think that they too have some soft of-

Dande:
You're right, I didn't really think about the people in the Capitol, I guess they're still people.

Newhope:
I wouldn't really give them too much credit, to be quite honest. They're surgically altering their bodies and stuff, just for fun.

O'Juice:
Don't people do that now?

Newhope:
But not on this large scale.

Walle:
Maybe they still have a heart, though.

Newhope:
Maybe that might pop up in book 2, that will probably happen.

Dande:
Do you know what I think was totally for book 2? That thing with the mute servant.

Chorus of agreement

Newhope:
Nothing develops at all. You just learn about it, and that's it.

Dande:
Maybe some of the people have a heart, like the make-up guy or whatever...

Jolly:
I liked him. He was awesome.

Dande:
And what about like the interviewer guy? Was he really trying to help people?

Chair:
I don't know what was with him.

Dande:
What did you guys think of the interviews? That was an interesting part of the book for me.

O'Juice:
It was kind of stupid, how she's giggling and turning around, saying, "Look at my dress! It's so cool!" I thought: shut up.

Chair:
"You know I'm going to die tomorrow, right?"

The Hunger Games-- The Capitol & Berries (Part 1)

Walle:
I was confused, if this is supposed to be in the future, after North America falls, then why are they all starving? I don't get why they have to result to bows and arrows instead of guns or something.

O'Juice:
Maybe the Capitol hid them from them.

Chair:
They're so poor the only thing they can afford to make is a bow and arrow.

O'Juice:
It's not like now when everyone's medium. Everyone's super rich in the Capitol, and then there's the people who are half dying.

Dande:
I wonder if she was trying to show-- if this was supposed to be America? That everyone in the Capitol is so heartless, and laughing at this like it's entertainment, is she trying to knock reality TV shows or something?

Newhope:
I don't really know... she's offered her little scenario of what could happen...

* * *

Smiley:
I liked how they made the Capitol look really bad, when they said, "Oh, the people from the same District can win!" and then they changed it around. I liked that.

Dande:
When I was reading that, I was so surprised.

Newhope:
Really? I was laughing.

Smiley:
I was happy they did that, because it would be too happy of an ending.

Jolly:
I didn't expect them to just say, "Ok, you both won." No, they had to make something more dramatic happen.

O'Juice:
I thought in the end that she would fight Peeta and then she would win or something like that.

Smiley:
I thought they would both die.

Dande:
Romeo and Juliet thing? Except in Romeo and Juliet they actually killed themselves...

Newhope:
You have all these expectations, and it doesn't reach your expectations, it just goes for a different route.

Dande:
But it was still good though!

Newhope:
Yeah, it doesn't go below or above, it's just... different.

Dande:
Original.

The Hunger Games-- Cornucopia, Wolves, & Injury

Newhope:
I was trying to picture the Cornucopia in my mind, it was kind of hard to picture what they were talking about.

O'Juice:
I think it was just this gigantic metal box sitting in the middle of this giant-

Walle:
I don't think it was a box-

Dande:
Isn't it the thing that they have at Thanksgiving?

Jolly:
It had to look like it was weaved, so that they could climb, so they had handholds.

Newhope:
The descriptions weren't that descriptive.

* * *

Chair:
Those wolves at the end creeped me out.

Newhope:
That was weird!

Jolly:
That was cool, but that was so freaky.

O'Juice: With the eyes?

Walle:
Do the wolves actually have their brains?

Newhope:
I don't think so.

Walle:
Or are they metal contraptions with just their eyes and their hair?

Smiley:
But if it was really them, wouldn't Rue turn on all the other wolves and try to protect Katniss?

O'Juice:
I think it was just their eyes to creep them out. "This is what's going to happen to you, hahahahah!"

Newhope:
I don't think they actually were the wolves, because they mentioned not destroying the bodies. I don't think they would have done that to them. They just made it look like they were. I hope they go into more detail on this in the next book.

Chair:

I think it was supposed to be, "These are all the people who you killed to get here... let's kill 'em again!"

Walle:
It also sort of had, "Your friends can turn on you," because the allies were there too.

O'Juice:
I think they just replicated the eyes.

Dande:
The book's supposed to be so futuristic, so I guess they could do that. They fixed Peeta's leg.

Chair:
Didn't they just replace his leg?

Newhope:
It sounds more like modern technology.

Chair:
It's like a 1984 kind of thing. The Capitol has all the weird technology that no one's sure about. Their technology is never fully explained.

Newhope:
That thing on the roof where you can't go off.

Chair:
And on the hovercraft, they had that too. They couldn't get off the hovercraft at the end of the Games.

Jolly:
Really? The first time she was on the hovercraft, I thought that was just her freezing up, then I figured out, "Oh...!"

Chair:
Well didn't they actually say there was a field that wouldn't let them out?

* * *

Jolly:
When she woke up, perfectly fixed, in the hospital room, that really annoyed me. They spend 200 pages making her that way: covered in dirt, can't hear through one ear, that cut, all the scars and everything. In a paragraph, they fix all that. You just don't do that.

Dande:
Well, they want her to be okay so they can break her in the next book.

Laughs

Jolly:
But still!

The Hunger Games-- Foxface, Rue, & Tresh

Dande:
What about the little girl, Rue? And how she died, and Katniss sang the song, what did you think of that?

Jolly:
That was really sweet but it was kind of boring.

Smiley:

Who thinks that she likes Rue more than Prim?

Dande:
I think she was a substitute.

Newhope:
You know something's up if it's considered an act of rebellion to put flowers on a dead girl.

Laughs

Chair:
Well doing that kind of takes away from the whole bloody massacre thing.

Newhope:
Yeah, but that really foreshadows, wow, that situation's not going to last forever.

* * *

Dande:
What do you think of the bombs and everything?

Jolly:
That was funny!

Newhope:
The landmines? That just added more tension to the entire beginning. I guess it was pretty funny.

Jolly:
How the kid redid them, around the food? That kid was awesome!

O'Juice:
But then he died.

Smiley:

That brings us to Foxface. What did you think of her?

Jolly:
Her death was hilarious.

O'Juice:
Yeah, like she's all so cunning, and then she dies because she's an idiot.

Chair:
"There goes the smartest person in these Games! Oh, wait..."

Dande:
I thought she would be a lot harder. I didn't think the big Hulky guy would be the last person standing, I thought it would be her, I thought she'd be trying to outwit them at the end.

Newhope:

Exactly.

Jolly:
I thought they'd end up fighting Rue at the end. Before they teamed up with Rue, I thought she would be at the end, because she's so small and cunning.

Chair:
Well, Katniss kind of mentions that in the beginning. She says, "Maybe someone else will kill her, so I don't have to."

Jolly:
That's why I wouldn't want to team up with the person from my District, until they announced the new rule, because I'd half to kill them off later anyway.

* * *

Chair:
I didn't like that Tresh didn't get an actual death, they just mentioned, "Oh, look, he's dead!" Didn't he just save your life ten minutes ago?

Newhope:
It was a really convenient way of getting rid of him without going any deeper.

Jolly:
They just knock people off and you half to assume that's what happened. For all we know, he ate the poisonous berries that Foxface ate.

Laughs

Dande:
Didn't they say that the people got him in the fields though?

Newhope:
Yeah, but I think it would be pretty hard to find him in the fields.

Walle:
And he's used to the fields, because he works there, so I don't think he should have died there.

The Hunger Games-- Career Tributes

Dande:
What did you guys think of the Career Tributes?

Jolly:
The Career Tributes? I think that they especially made the rest of the tributes really mad, because they volunteered. They're hoping they end up there.

O'Juice:
I feel like they're idiots, and they're, I'm sorry, they're suicidal!

Jolly:
They're training to go kill themselves.

Chair:
They've trained to the point where no one else could possibly stop them-

Dande:
-except they do stop them!

Smiley:
But wouldn't that be better than just having some random person who's barely anything be forced to go into the Games?

Dande:
It's not fair to the other people who are forced to go, and then they can beat them so easily.

Chair:
They trained for their whole lives so they could slaughter 23 other people and return home as celebrities.

Walle:
And I don't think they need it, because they were already so rich.

Dande:
Well not rich, just richer than the other Districts.

Walle:
Yeah.

Jolly:
In District 12, you have to go in, no one wants to volunteer to take your place. Katniss only volunteered because Prim would have had to go in, which I don't get how that happened because Gale had like 42-

Chair:
But then they'd have to write something about Gale. They'd already dropped him by that point.

Laughs

Jolly:
But that's not the point. In District 12, unless there's someone else to volunteer to take your place, you have to go. Everyone in the rich Districts is volunteering to go because they've been trained for it their whole lives.

Newhope:
Which is technically illegal...

Walle:
I have a question, how do you think they're chosen? Because I'm pretty sure that a lot of people-

Dande:
Yeah, there'd be more than one who wants to volunteer.

Jolly:
Just let the people who want to go duke it out.

Dande:
Maybe they have procedures in the other towns.

O'Juice:
I guess they'd take everyone who volunteered and then pick their names.

* * *

Dande:
But if this was real life, do you think the Careers would be better than they were in the book?

Chair:
The Careers weren't as good as everyone said they were. Once they lost the food, they all just started dying off.

Dande:
But I wonder because, they had to not be uber awesome because then Katniss couldn't win, and obviously she and Peeta had to win for the book to work, but if this was real, don't you think that the Career people would be some much better?

Newhope:
It's still technically illegal, so they can't be so overpowered that the Capitol knows they they've been training them.

Dande:
Oh yeah, I forgot that.