The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins (review)

In this prequel to Hunger Games (BCCB 11/08), everyone's least favorite bloodand-rose-scented president, Coriolanus Snow, is here an impoverished post-war eighteen-year-old on the cusp of the tenth Hunger Games, where he will serve as a mentor in hopes of winning a full-ride scholarship. Coriolanus lucks out with his initially disappointing District 12 tribute: Lucy Gray Baird is a sixteen-year-old performer who captures the hearts of the Capitol and eventually Coriolanus himself. As Snow strives to stand out and conceal his family's empty pockets, he'll break whatever rules he can to win the Games and achieve glory and control over his life. Collins sweeps us back into this unpolished version of the Hunger Games: the tributes are dumped together in a zoo cage before the Games, and the arena is a decrepit coliseum with stands rather than the clever contraptions Gamemakers craft decades later. Coriolanus is an insidious antagonist, a Nice Guy figure who is frequently propelled into jealousy and the need to control Lucy Gray, even manipulating her environment to his needs. He defies the Capitol and its laws only as it applies to his personal success, even fatally betraying a friend; the nature of his villainy comes from the subtle escalation of his obsessive behaviors into others' misfortune. Hunger Games fans who have been craving more all these years will enjoy getting some more backstory about how the Games came to be.