Cinna – Bookmarked!

Happy Hunger Games!

All weekend, people have been asking me how I found the Hunger Games movie so I decided a blog post was in order for the occasion.

I think I’ve been half-excited, half-scared ever since the movie was announced, the way I am whenever a favorite book hits the big screen. Everyone knows I’m not a big fan of film adaptations — I’d be perfectly happy leaving my favorite books as they are, in my imagination, where, in my experience, they’re a whole lot better.

Lately, though, I’ve been quite, erm, reckless (hehe!) in watching film adaptations — I think, now that Harry Potter is over, I’ve conditioned myself to thinking it can’t get any worse. I’ve caught quite a number of them in the past few months — and of books I love, too! — and I admit it hasn’t been half bad. The Adventures of Tintin was awesome (but underappreciated, I think!); The Girl with A Dragon Tattoo was a bit too Hollywood for my taste (too pretty!), and Noomi Rapace will always be my choice for Lisbeth Salander, but the Hollywood version did work well as a narrative. and Hugo — it was, hands down one of the best movies I have ever seen, and *gasp* I actually enjoyed it more than the book!

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The Hunger Games movie trailer… and Seneca Crane’s beard!

A couple days ago, we finally got to see the Hunger Games official movie trailer.

Not being a fan of movie adaptations in general, and iffy on some casting choices for the film, I must confess I was dreading the trailer. Of course, that didn’t stop me from clicking on the link and putting the trailer on loop, like every other Hunger Games fanatic out there.

And I must say, it’s gotten me curious enough to — gasp — actually watch the movie!

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The Mockingjay has landed!

(first published in Manila Bulletin)

The long wait is finally over for fans of Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games trilogy, as “Mockingjay,” the final installment in Scholastic’s hottest property since Harry Potter, was released worldwide this week.

Since “Mockingjay” was announced in December 2009, fans have kept an eye on the countdown clock as they held their breaths on the fate of the series heroine, Katniss Everdeen, and the nation of Panem. Much of the fandom is based online: fan pages, countdown counters and badges, miles of fan fiction, online book clubs and book discussions, and blog tours.

“Mockingjay” has been so highly anticipated that even those in the literary circles were scrabbling about for advance copies, but to no avail. Scholastic kept it under wraps, more closely guarded than “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” that furor ensued all over the internet when Andrew Sims, administrator of Harry Potter fan site mugglenet.com, tweeted that he got ahold of a copy nearly two weeks before the release.

And when a video of Suzanne Collins reading the first few paragraphs of “Mockingjay” was posted on the internet one day before the release, fans all over the world hung on to her every word.

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Catching Fire (and the HG fever continues!)

I know this is way overdue, as I finished Catching Fire three weeks ago. But the book fair, the two storms (and the great flood) that hit the country, my trip to Singapore (more on that on a future post!), and rearranging the house (ugh, reshelving my books, and still resuscitating those that went under during the flood) have kept me pretty busy and this is the first weekend I’ve had to myself in a long time.

If you’ve just discovered my blog, well, I read Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games (Scholastic Press) about a month back, and to my surprise, it slaked that craving I had for a really good read, and about time too, as I’d spent more than half of the year looking for a book to wow me.

Several days later, I got ahold of the I had newly-released sequel, Catching Fire, and finished it just before I had the thrill of watching the Hunger Games Live Action Role Play (LARP) at the Manila International Book Fair, organized by Scholastic and National Bookstore with the New Worlds Alliance.

(Spoiler free!)

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The Hunger Games

It’s been nine months into 2009 and I’ve been hard-pressed to find a book to really wow me this year, and I must say that I did not expect it to be a book I would not normally go for.

I’ve been seeing Scholastic’s The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (book #140 for 2009) at the book stores for some time now, but I’m not a big fan of dystopian themes because they’re often depressing, so I didn’t feel compelled to pick it up.

When I was given a chance to review the book, I was apprehensive, especially after learning it came highly recommended by Stephenie Meyer and Charlaine Harris, two authors I don’t particularly care for, as I abhorred the Twilight series (no secret there) and have no intentions of reading the Sookie Stackhouse series.

So I finished The Hunger Games in three hours flat this afternoon — and even Ateneo (my university) winning the basketball game (for top seed) against FEU this afternoon couldn’t tear me away from the book except for quick glances at the screen for the score — and I still can’t get over how much this book has affected me, so here I am, writing this rough cut review (am writing another for Manila Bulletin later on when I get my thoughts organized) to pour out some raw emotion after reading the book, before I read what anyone else has to say about it, and before I forget the roller coaster experience I just went through.

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