With Thanksgiving around the corner, for those who celebrate it, I wanted to take some time to share a book series that I am incredibly thankful for. As a writer and reader, there has been an endless supply of books that have been important to me and inspired me, but there is one book series that I consider a "Mount Rushmore" of books for me. That book, or rather book series, for me is The Hunger Games.
The Hunger Games
The Hunger Games is a popular book series written by Suzanne Collins that ended up being a worldwide hit and developed into a movie series as well. The world Suzanne Collins created way back in 2008 has continued to grow as a prequel book, A Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, was released in 2020 and a movie based on the book premiered in 2023. On top of that, it seems like the prequel book is turning into a prequel series as a new book, Sunrise on the Reaping, is set to be released on March 18th, 2025 with a movie based on the book set to premiere on November 20th, 2026.
Why I am Thankful
As an aspiring writer and someone who, according to his Kindle stats, has read for 48 straight weeks, it may come as a surprise that from the ages of about 9 to 16 I never really read at all. I didn't want to read. The only books I read were for school or short sports books that were about thirty pages so I could get my reading points for the month. My mom did read me the Harry Potter books as they came out, but I wasn't the one reading. After the last Harry Potter book came out in 2007, I had no intentions of any book or book series at all. Enter, The Hunger Games
Now, keeping the theme of honesty, I didn't start reading The Hunger Games books until all three had already been published. In fact, I watched the movie first in 2012 and was so interested in the story I decided I couldn't wait to find out what happened. I am thankful because The Hunger Games was the first book and book series, in almost a decade, that made me decide to find the books and start reading again. I borrowed the books from a co-worker of my mom's and read all three of the books in about a month. From there, I read the Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini in about two months. All I would do is get home from rehearsals or school or practice, eat, and then read. My weekends were filled with reading. I ended up returning to some books I read and was slightly interested in but never finished like Gregor the Overlander series also by Suzanne Collins. While starting my reintroduction into reading, I had no idea how authors could be so detailed and specific to write novels and knew I would never do that. Now, over a decade later, I'm a freelance writer who is working on his first novel with plans for about six or seven more written in my notebook for the future. I am very grateful for The Hunger Games for the person I have become today after reading that series.
There is a lot more to that, I think, about how The Hunger Games helped me become the person I am today, but that may be a story for another day. Are there any books or book series that you are thankful for? If so, maybe they would be a good last-second holiday present for when you inevitably wait until the last second to buy those gifts. I say this as someone who is totally not about to go to my list and start buying gifts I just remembered I haven't gotten yet...Anyway, keep reading. Andiamo!