Tiffany’s Comments (group member since Mar 16, 2014)

Tiffany’s comments from the UIU Library group.

Hi everyone! My name is Tiffany. I am a Financial Management student at UIU and managed to take a little time out of my busy schedule to read this book. Even before Jodi sent out her email invite for the book club, I had planned on trying to read this book before going to see the movie.

Personally I enjoyed this book overall and feel one of the main reason I did so was because I really had no strong expectations of the book before I started to read it. My favorite genres of books are typically more violent and tend to fall in the sci-fi or fantasy category so the violent nature of the book did not bother me as much as it may have some other readers. I will say I was mildly surprised the book focused so heavily on the violent training aspect of prospective candidates and felt the ending seemed very rushed as a result.

I agree with the others that there was not a lot character development present beyond the main character. I found myself not caring when certain people in the book died because I never felt an attachment to these characters. I also felt the dialog present in the book seemed hollow at times but imagine this is due to the fact the reader only learned about the main character. In a way I really didn't expect there to be too much character development mainly due to the fact this book is geared more towards younger readers. In my opinion, younger readers seem to be more focused on the overall story than understanding one’s psyche on a deeper level.

I am planning on seeing the movie but won’t rearrange my schedule to see it in theaters. In comparison to the book, I’m hoping the training portion of the candidates is cut down to at most half of the movie - this would give the movie director more time to focus on the climatic ending.