The Hunger Games

The Hunger Games is a trilogy of young adult dystopian novels written by American novelist Suzanne Collins. The series is set in The Hunger Games universe, and follows young Katniss Everdeen. The novels in the trilogy are titled The Hunger Games (2008), Catching Fire (2009), and Mockingjay (2010). The novels have all been developed into films starring Jennifer Lawrence, with the film adaptation of Mockingjay split into two parts. The first two books in the series were both New York Times best sellers, and Mockingjay topped all US bestseller lists upon its release. By the time the film adaptation of The Hunger Games was released in 2012, the publisher had reported over 26 million Hunger Games trilogy books in print, including movie tie-in books. The Hunger Games universe is a dystopia set in Panem, a North American country consisting of the wealthy Capitol and 12 districts in varying states of poverty. Every year, children from the districts are selected via lottery to participate in a compulsory televised battle royale death match called The Hunger Games. The novels were all well received. In August 2012, the series ranked second, exceeded only by the Harry Potter series in NPR's poll of the top 100 teen novels, which asked voters to choose their favorite young adult books. On August 17, 2012, Amazon announced The Hunger Games trilogy as its top seller, surpassing the record previously held by the Harry Potter series. As of 2014, the trilogy has sold more than 65 million copies in the U.S. alone (more than 28 million copies of The Hunger Games, more than 19 million copies of Catching Fire, and more than 18 million copies of Mockingjay). The Hunger Games trilogy has been sold into 56 territories in 51 languages to date. A prequel novel about the early days of Panem hosting The Hunger Games is being written and to be released on 19 May 2020. The Hunger Games trilogy takes place in an unspecified future time, in the dystopian, post-apocalyptic nation of Panem, located in North America. The country consists of a wealthy Capitol city, located in the Rocky Mountains, surrounded by twelve (originally thirteen) poorer districts ruled by the Capitol. The Capitol is lavishly rich and technologically advanced, but the districts are in varying states of poverty. The trilogy's narrator and protagonist Katniss Everdeen, lives in District 12, the poorest region of Panem, located in Appalachia, where people regularly die of starvation. As punishment for a past rebellion against the Capitol (called the 'Dark Days'), in which District 13 was supposedly destroyed, one boy and one girl from each of the twelve remaining districts, between the ages of 12 and 18, are selected by lottery to compete in an annual pageant called the Hunger Games. The Games are a televised event in which the participants, called 'tributes', are forced to fight to the death in a dangerous public arena. The winning tribute and his/her home district are then rewarded with food, supplies, and riches. The purposes of the Hunger Games are to provide entertainment for the Capitol and to remind the districts of the Capitol's power and lack of remorse,forgetfulness, and forgiveness for the failed rebellion of the current competitors' ancestors. Each book in The Hunger Games trilogy has three sections of nine chapters each. Collins has said this format comes from her playwriting background, which taught her to write in a three-act structure; her previous series, The Underland Chronicles, was written in the same way. She sees each group of nine chapters as a separate part of the story, and comments still call those divisions 'act breaks'. Collins says she drew inspiration for the series from both classical and contemporary sources. Her main classical source of inspiration is the Greek myth of Theseus and the Minotaur, in which, as a punishment for past crimes, Minos forces Athens to sacrifice seven youths and seven maidens to the Minotaur, which kills them in a vast labyrinth. Collins says that even as a child, she was stunned by the idea since 'it was just so cruel' to force Athens to sacrifice its own children.