YA Fiction that doesn't suck

[oselle]

A friend at work loaned me the first two books of Suzanne Collins's The Hunger Games. Given what passes for best-selling young adult fiction these days (q.v. Twilight), I was pleasantly surprised to discover that so far, they are not dreadful (though I'm only about 2/3 of the way through the first book).

The Hunger Games actually reminds me an awful lot of the kind of dystopian young-adult fantasy I read when I was a young adult myself. This was back in the days before children's fiction ever landed on the New York Times bestseller list, much less got made into blockbuster movies. There was one in particular that I remember, though I can't recall the name. It was about a group of orphans locked up in some testing facility where they have to perform increasingly bizarre rituals in order to obtain food from a little box. Every time the box flashes a colored light, they have to devise new perfomances and rituals in order to make it spit out some food. The things they have to do start out as simple acts, like clapping and dancing, but eventually the experiment escalates until they wind up murdering at least one of their companions to appease the box. Then the conductors of the experiment (who are never revealed) are apparently satisfied with their results and release these poor Pavlovian wrecks out into the street, where the last time we see them, they're mindlessly clapping and dancing in front of a simple streetlight. Bleak fare indeed. This is the stuff I was reading when I was twelve.

Anyway, The Hunger Games is a lot like that only far more marketable in a Hollywood sense. Much like The Passage (IMO, an inferior book), the cast of characters is young, attractive and, to use the current term, "ethnically ambiguous" which means they'll have to find someone who looks like a young Jessica Alba to play the "olive-skinned, gray-eyed" heroine, Katniss Everdeen.

Katniss lives in some future North America that has been so ravaged by war and natural disasters that now only the nation of Panem exists where the United States used to be. Panem consists of a wealthy, technologically advanced Capitol surrounded by twelve hardscrabble "Districts" whose citizens toil to supply the Capitol with everything from fuel to food to luxury goods. Katniss is from District 12, a coal-mining district in the Appalachian Mountains.

We're told that 75 years ago, the Districts rebelled against the Capitol but were crushed by the Capitol's superior military might. As punishment, the Capitol keeps the Districts under constant surveillance, in poverty, and often close to starvation. They also instituted "The Hunger Games," in which once a year, every District child between 12 and 18 must enter a televised lottery. One girl and one boy (called "tributes") are chosen from each District and then dropped off in some wilderness where they are expected to fight each other to the death until only one is left standing. The Games are mandatory television viewing throughout Panem -- gory entertainment (and wagering) for the Capitol citizens, a harsh reminder of who's in charge for those in the Districts.

It's not at all bad. It's written in my least-favorite tense, the present, (first-person present tense, nonetheless), and Katniss is a textbook Mary-Sue who is not only exceptionally skilled at everything but is also adored by two handsome boys even though she, of course, cannot see anything special about her olive-skinned, gray-eyed self. (I have to remind myself that twelve-year-old girls usually DO like these kinds of heroines.) Nevertheless, it's fast-moving and engaging and at times genuinely gripping, with none of the plodding agonies of Twilight. In fact, I think Suzanne Collins gets off a sneaky jab at Stephenie Meyer -- at one point, Katniss has been stung by some genetically enhanced wasps and hallucinates that she sees her District co-tribute (and eventual love interest) "sparkling," which she wisely chalks up to the effects of toxic venom. (It should be noted that there's a glowing blurb from Stephenie Meyer on the back cover. Maybe she will learn something about "plot.")

The one thing that annoys me, though, is that Katniss and all the other District children seem far too well educated. The notion that District kids would have anything but the most rudimentary education seems completely unrealistic. We're told over and over again that the Capitol cruelly oppresses the Districts, exploiting their population as cheap labor. Well, you don't waste money educating your cheap labor. And you certainly don't educate your cheap labor if you're worried about them rebelling against you someday. Katniss even talks about her "music teacher" and I thought, my God, how many kids in Appalachia TODAY have a music teacher, much less in some post-apocalyptic dystopian Appalachia?

I can buy into any universe, but suspension of disbelief is key, and overlooking an important world-building detail like this is one of by big pet peeves about fantasy. I could accept that the District kids were clever survivors, self-taught out of sheer necessity, but I can't accept them reminiscing about their school days or their music teachers. The kids of Katniss's District would all have been in the mines by the time they were school-aged...just as children in our own real world were (and are) sent off to work as soon as they're big enough to hold a needle or pick crops or crank a lever. With so many examples of child labor (and oppressed populations) in the real world, I don't understand how an author could get something so wrong.

Still, it's not a bad read.

Comments

[shoofus.livejournal.com]

consistent world building seems to be beyond the grasp of a lot of writers, unfortunately. it really can throw my belief in a world right out the window if the parts don't jibe, this sounds like a pretty big issue acutally as education is a key force for social and political empowerment...educating the oppressed masses who are then going to mine coal seems like a major contradiction...

fyi Justified is on tv tonight on fx, you might want to check this miniseries out, if you haven't yet seen the first season, this is the start of the second

[oselle.livejournal.com]

The other incongruity is that the wealthier Districts have "Career Tributes," literally kids who have been trained all their lives to participate in the Games. I can appreciate that the Capitol citizens want good entertainment, but if the real purpose of the Games is to keep the Districts under the Capitol's thumb, would Panem's leaders really allow anyone in the Districts to be training a small army of warrior children? Talk about asking for trouble.

Justified has been recommended to me by many people but for some reason, it just never caught hold with me.

[shoofus.livejournal.com]

well the main character is an annoying smirker, but there are very interesting moments with a lot of the other characters that make it worth watching

[claudia603.livejournal.com]

It was about a group of orphans locked up in some testing facility where they have to perform increasingly bizarre rituals in order to obtain food from a little box.

OMG I REMEMBER THAT BOOK!

[oselle.livejournal.com]

Read downthread for the title. I can't believe anyone besides me read that book!

[liptonrm.livejournal.com]

Seriously, what the fuck is up with all of the first person, present tense narrative in YA fiction, or, hell, fiction in general? I HATE YOU SO FUCKING MUCH STEPHANIE MEYER! Because it's usually Twilight's fault.

That being said, I too enjoyed The Hunger Games. In fact, each sequel is better than the one before it. It's not high art, but I do enjoy a good dystopia and so many of the characters are a lot of fun. And when they inevitably make the third book into a movie it'll be like fanfic h/c porn brought to life on the big screen.

They're not perfect, and I certainly haven't spent too much time in deep thought over them, but they were a lot of fun to read and they didn't make me want to kill people when I was done. For what that's worth.

Oh holy hell, what is the name of that book about the kids who were Pavlovian conditioned? I know I read it back in the day. This is going to bug the hell out of me until I track it down.

[liptonrm.livejournal.com]

House of Stairs by William Sleator! Thank you Google for knowing all.

[oselle.livejournal.com]

OMG how did you ever find that!? What search terms did you enter...I wouldn't even know where to begin!

I remember the stairs. The first time I ever saw an MC Escher print (years after I read that book) I thought, It's that book!!

I can't believe you even read that. You're a lot younger than I am. I'm surprised it was still in the YA rotation for your generation.

[oselle.livejournal.com]

it'll be like fanfic h/c porn brought to life

Are you kidding me? The h/c porn is already front-and-center in the first book. I'm up to the part where Katniss finds Peeta horribly wounded (and feverish!!!) in the woods and improbably nurses him back to health against all odds and all I can think is how many times I've seen this scenario play out in fanfic. It could be Sam and Dean or Casey and Zeke or Sam and Frodo or your OTP of choice. LOL, it's pretty great.

Collins's background is in writing kids' television, but she MUST have been writing fanfic on the side. She's got the formula down pat. I'm surprised Katniss doesn't annoy the shit out of you though -- I've seldom encountered a more classic Mary Sue. Beautiful, noble, self-sacrificing, unfailingly good at everything she sets her hand to and of course, completely oblivious to her own glaringly obvious perfection. I imagine she'll spend the next couple of books leading the inevitable District rebellion while all the time self-depreciatingly wondering how "someone like me" ever became the great heroine of her people.

ETA: Katniss is nevertheless a huge improvement over Bella Swan. When Bella wonders what anyone sees in her, Meyer may think she's being modestly self-depreciating, but I'm sitting there wondering the exact same thing.

[dodger-sister.livejournal.com]

liptonrm has been telling me for like a month now that she has a book she thinks I should read and then she finally remembered to loan it to me like a week ago. This is it.

We'll have to discuss when I read it.

Though if it is written in first person, I am going to have serious mind-block getting past that. I hate first person so much.

[oselle.livejournal.com]

The present tense thing is far more annoying to me than first person. If I could get past THAT I'm sure you can get past the first person narration.

I just finished the first book today and immediately launched into the second. It's not epic literature but it IS great storytelling and that's SO refreshing. What with the success of dreck like Twilight I've been feeling like real storytelling is a dying art.