Summary

Sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen has lived with the threat of the Hunger Games looming over her head her entire life. Still, that knowledge does little to prepare her to face them when she volunteers to take her little sister’s place in the annual event, because Katniss knows that the odds of her coming home from the Games alive are slim to none. A fight to the death on national TV, the Games are a lethal form of punishment devised by The Capitol as a means of exerting power over the 12 districts of the nation of Panem. The Capitol forces each district to send one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen every year to participate in this brutal and violent battle royal. The winner of the Games receives fame, fortune, and enough food to sustain them for life in a society where poverty and starvation plague the masses, while the 23 losers of the Games go home in body bags.


No one expects this poor girl from District 12 to be a competitor in the Games, but Katniss has been fighting for her and her family’s survival for years, and she is not about to go down without a fight. Armed with a bow and arrow and dropped in an arena in the middle of the woods, Katniss might actually have a chance to win. But does she really want to win if it means the death of not only 22 strangers, but also her fellow district 12 competitor, Peeta? Readers will not be able to put down this fast-paced, exciting first novel in The Hunger Games Trilogy as they race to the conclusion of the Seventy-Fourth annual Hunger Games.

Click to watch a book trailer for The Hunger Games.