Anyway, I do a lot of confessing on this blog, and I have another one to share. Brace yourself.
I have not read Hunger Games yet.
*waiting for you to pick your jaw off the floor*
Truth be told, I haven't felt the urge to read it yet, but I did hear that the author had written a middle-grade series before her HG success. I did want to read that. So I picked up the first book. And here it is.
Shop Indiebound Gregor the Overlander (Book 1 in the Underland Chronicles)
by Suzanne Collins
For: 8-12-year-olds
Genre: Fantasy Adventure
Published: 2003
Description: When Gregor falls through a grate in the laundry room of his apartment building, he hurtles into the dark Underland, where spiders, rats, cockroaches coexist uneasily with humans. This world is on the brink of war, and Gregor's arrival is no accident. A prophecy foretells that Gregor has a role to play in the Underland's uncertain future. Gregor wants no part of it -- until he realizes it's the only way to solve the mystery of his father's disappearance. Reluctantly, Gregor embarks on a dangerous adventure that will change both him and the Underland forever.
Why I Liked It: You should know that I really hate cockroaches. I've lived in Texas once for a few years, so I know what real, big, ten-gallon-hat-wearing cockroaches look like. But they are nothing compared to the roaches in this book. So, oddly enough, I liked the roaches in this book. And any book that can make me like roaches is a winner in my eyes.
Oh, and the adventure in this book sucked me right in. I suppose that's a good reason to like it, too.
If you know of any other underworld adventures, please share them in the comments below. And happy weekend reading!
Yeah, that's another series of hers that I think I'll skip. (I have big issues with insects, especially spiders and cockroaches. And HG sounds way too violent for my tast, too.) But lots of people obviously like her writing, so I'm in the minority.
ReplyDelete"taste" not "tast" :-)
DeleteI wouldn't blame you for skipping it. Though I should mention that the animals in this book walk and talk, so it was more like reading about an alien species, and not, you know, icky bugs. ;)
DeleteAnd this isn't violent like I hear HG is. So there's that. But I hear you. I'm not enticed by violence of any kind, so I'm not rushing to read HG anytime soon. Or watch the movie, come to think of it.
I loved the Gregor series. More than Hunger Games. It probably would be difficult to make good movies based on the Gregor series because of the insect and rat main characters, but they are exceptionally well presented in this series, and were not a deterrent at all after getting into the first book a ways. My wife read HG first and told me what it was about and I thought, "What kind of woman have I married?" Then I read it and decided the violence, at least by my standards, which are subjective, was done in good taste, and not at all gratuitously. Same for the movie, which was not as good as the book, but was still a solid 7 or 8 out of 10.
ReplyDelete