So The Hunger Games will always be nostalgic for me. I remember growing up reading them and watching the films. It’s been a while since The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is out, but I’ve finally read it! Keep reading this book review of The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes for my full thoughts.
Summary
Ambition will fuel him.
Competition will drive him.
But power has its price.
It is the morning of the reaping that will kick off the tenth annual Hunger Games. In the Capitol, eighteen-year-old Coriolanus Snow is preparing for his one shot at glory as a mentor in the Games. The once-mighty house of Snow has fallen on hard times, its fate hanging on the slender chance that Coriolanus will be able to outcharm, outwit, and outmaneuver his fellow students to mentor the winning tribute.
The odds are against him. He’s been given the humiliating assignment of mentoring the female tribute from District 12, the lowest of the low. Their fates are now completely intertwined — every choice Coriolanus makes could lead to favor or failure, triumph or ruin. Inside the arena, it will be a fight to the death. Outside the arena, Coriolanus starts to feel for his doomed tribute… and must weigh his need to follow the rules against his desire to survive no matter what it takes.
Review
Okay so The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes was always going to be a hard sell for me. And tonally it will be different than The Hunger Games because that follows a story of rebellion and we know where Snow ends up. The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes instead becomes a story about belief, in being given chances, and also in ultimately ambition. I appreciated all the little touches and references to what we know is coming – as well as what we knew about the past. These were some of my favorite paragraphs to annotate.
We witness Snow’s poverty and how the family, and most of the capital, finds a scapegoat in the rebels. They see the districts as basically animals. This is a metaphor that is consistently drawn throughout The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. All these connections we see which connects the tributes, and the districts as a whole, to the dehumanization. The ways their deaths are seen as tools of fear and oppression. There’s a layer of spectacle and control. We also witness that no one is safe in the control of the capital as various characters treat the mentors almost as experiments as well.
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While the Capital has, in many ways, won, it’s more about control. If we can’t fully ignite a fire, the best we can hope for is control. And control is constant. My main complaint with this may be the ending, mostly because I wanted to know a bit more about Snow’s rise to power. To some degree, there’s some frustration with Snow, but that was always going to be the case because of who he is. The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes explores whether we are all one moment away from violence when we need it.
Overall,
I’m glad I read The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. It was basically sort of what I expected, but it still felt indulgent to be back in the world. I was always on my toes in this one and it definitely surprised me in the end. There’s also this tendency to try to root for the main character even though we KNOW, so I do appreciate how Collins almost manipulates us in that sense as well. Find The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes on Goodreads, Storygraph, Amazon, Bookshop. org, Blackwells, & Libro. fm.