Book 30 The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes

The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins fulfilled the “Book Published in 2020” category of the PopSugar Reading Challenge. The novel is a prequel of the Hunger Games series by the same author. This novel chronicles President Snow in his formative years. It was published in May 2020.

I read the Hunger Games series long ago and had a very hard time with it, especially the first title.  Just the idea of children killing each other made me sick. The writing was fine, and the storyline good. But the plot was pure Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery. Ms. Collins tackled a controversial topic and did well (until the end of Mocking Jay, but that’s another story). Personally, I think The Hunger Games should be taught in high school.

But I never understood the teen response to the books. People made Hunger Games play-a-longs in Minecraft and had Hunger Games themed birthday parties. It seemed they missed the point of an authoritarian government forcing the poor and underprivileged to sacrifice their children. Teens didn’t seem to see that, and no one explained it to them. When my girls were old enough and had an interest, I talked to them about it, told them about The Lottery, and cautioned them about the violence.

The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes narrative shows how President Snow became the man he was in the first book of the series. I have no clue. The novel gave some great insight into how we got to Katniss’s story. But Snow is still a mystery. It’s as if Ms. Collins wanted to dump a big backstory on us to explain how we got to Katniss with a story about another character.

Spoilers ahead.

Snow’s tale reminded me of Heartless by Marissa Meyer, author of the Lunar Chronicles. In that novel, Ms. Meyer tells the origin story of the Queen of Hearts. Like Ms. Collins, we route for this villain until the end when they completely change gears, personalities, and tacks. Snow was a pretty good guy until the last few pages. (He was a spoiled brat, but I digress.) I do not understand what happened in the ending scene. His life was tragic in a “poor, little rich boy” way, but there were no feels to set up his break. Heartless was the same. A true villain story should make us think “hey, they weren’t so bad, just misunderstood.” This book failed to do that.

The rest of the novel was okay, the same style as the other three. But again, the feels were shallow. It showed the deeply troubled mindset of Capital residents with the cluelessness only the rich can have. It says something about the times we are living in but does not hold up as a story to relate to, like Katniss’s. Had the author chosen to give us a deep look into Snow and made him a better man, his fall would have impacted us more. But as it was, I saw a spoiled boy get betrayed (though I have no clue how he realized it) and throw a temper tantrum.

Let’s talk about titles for a second. It’s not pretty and rather deceptive. Yes, the mocking jay had a huge role in the first three books. But if Snow is the snake and Lucy Grey the songbird, then why wasn’t this apparent until the very last second? Both animals were represented in the book, but Snow was never tied to the snake. Was Lucy Grey also the snake? What happened to her in the end?

Don’t get me started on some of the character’s first names. The audio reader was tripping over them throughout the story.

This was not my favorite. 

I give The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins Three Colorful Venomous Snakes.