The Hunger Games

Yesterday I finished reading Mockingjay, the third volume in the Hunger Games trilogy, and immediately started crying.

I expected the trilogy to be the sort of thrilling, fast-paced sci-fi/fantasy experience that I enjoy.  I didn't expect the trilogy to provide such a heartbreaking look into the horrors of war.  I cried when I finished it not so much because of the fictional events in the books themselves, but because the devastation, the senseless violence, the utter waste that the books so vividly portrayed are present in real war.  The reality that there are wars being waged right now, that there are people dying right now, in the same stupid and horrific way as in these books, hit me all at once and I had to take a while to process it before I could surface back into the equally real everyday world that I live in: my family, my cats, my new house, good food, great new plays written by dear friends.  And just as the trilogy called up real-life horror, it called up real-life beauty, too.  The love and humor amongst the characters resonated with me just as deeply as the violence and suspense in the action sequences.  After I wiped my tears away I took a moment to feel the intense gratitude that followed my sorrow: gratitude for all the amazing people in my life, and gratitude for the fact that all of those people are relatively safe and happy.