My original thought when this came out was "why do we need this?" But I should not have doubted Suzanne Collins. It ended up being a really interesting story. (And if it was a cash grab, she would have picked a more popular character). I was invested in how conflicted Snow was, and loved the dynamic between him and Lucy Gray. But at the same time, Snow isn't romanticized or redeemed - you can see inside his head, and a lot of his characteristics and selfishness and entitlement have always been there. You start to understand him (somewhat). But it's not one of those "villain redemption stories."

I think the story was a bit too rushed and a little underwhelming at the end. But overall, I enjoyed this one a lot more than I expected to!

This one felt more brutal than previous books, but also had more heart and human-ness. The propaganda themes were a bit heavy handed - but looking at the US right now, maybe we need more heavy handedness. We should pay attention to the themes of manipulation of narratives in the media....!

I was wondering why we even needed this book, since we basically knew what happened - but turns out that what we knew about Haymitch's games before was propaganda! And Suzanne Collins still managed to throw in some fun twists and turns. I loved the characterizations of the younger versions of characters we know, and love the new ones as well. And, it answers a lot of questions like "why didn't the districts fight back for 74 years?" I thought the book was well thought out and well done!