Mockingjay: TikTok made me buy it! The third book in the international No.1 bestselling series: 3 (The Hunger Games) Paperback – 1 Dec. 2011

WARNING - a few spoilers - I don't do book reviews but felt compelled to for Mockingjay after reading some rather negative ones. I'm nearly 50 and appreciate that this trilogy is aimed at the Young Adult market, so perhaps my opinion is irrelevant but nevertheless I just wanted to air my views. I loved the trilogy so much that I read it twice and felt quite bereft at the end because I would no longer be able to share my evenings with Katniss & Co. Goodness knows what I'll read next. There has been some criticism of Katniss in Mockingjay, which is, of course, criticism of the Author. The main criticisms appear to be Katniss' lack of empathy for her dead comrades, her indecisions, her bouts of weakness, her lack of leadership, and why did she kill Coin? I think it is easy to forget that, in the end, she is merely 17 years old, not even an adult, and huge responsibility has been thrust upon her - more than most adults would be able to cope with. Whilst she's not your `common or garden' 17 year old, she is, nevertheless very, very young and is, quite understandably, inexperienced and in many ways extremely immature and vulnerable with it. I think the Author captures that vulnerability incredibly well. Katniss is young enough to be my granddaughter and I felt very protective of her and could empathise with her enormously. At her age I would have shrunk from a fraction of the terrors she has had to face. In real life she would have probably had complete mental meltdown, the fact that she showed weakness and indecision on many occasions in Mockingjay simply makes the plot more believable in my view. As for her lack of empathy when major characters, like Finnick, are killed off - surely that is also entirely understandable? Towards the end she is, once again, fighting to survive in terrible circumstances - is desensitised to extreme violence due to having experienced it so many times - and her own life is not just in danger but under direct threat - she is clinging to survival and fleeing from the enemy with hardly any time to think, never mind empathise. I wonder how many people in exactly the same circumstances would have time to think empathetic thoughts about their comrades with death, literally, knocking at the door? She is running for her life, people change when the survival instinct kicks in, they lose the `luxury' of mourning their losses - that comes later (as I think it does with Katniss at the very end). I think the Author captures this almost `animal' instinct for survival very, very well. As for killing Coin, well that's because Coin was the one who ordered the parachute drop that killed Prim - quite simply Katniss takes revenge and, further, sees that Coin is no better than Snow, and that the Hunger Games will be perpetuated whilst ever Coin is in charge - no Coin, end of Hunger Games. I loved Mockingjay, I thought it was a very satisfying end to a quite remarkable trilogy, with a remarkable cast and, in my view, one of the greatest and, more importantly, one of the most believable and 'human' literary heroines of our time. I loved Katniss for her weaknesses, her cynicism, her honesty and her bravery. I will miss her.

The first two books of this trilogy: The Hunger Games and Catching Fire have both been exceptionally written and both had an excellent, exciting execution. I would highly recommend both of them to anyone.Although I given this book a 5 star rating, I believe there are a few 'kinks' with this book that have not been experienced with the two previous ones. Firstly, the novel starts off to be quite slow, boring and generally uninteresting leaving the reader somewhat demoralised and therefore hoping for more in the rest of the book, which sadly does not come up to expectations. However, as I have said the expectations are very high due to the lacking introduction. Personally, I found the introduction repetitive but according to physologists, the way in which Katniss continually behaves is normal, therefore showing that this book is actually slightly factual. Eventually, after the boredom of the start of the book, we begin to see more action unfold. From here, the book is superbly and masterfully written.The teams of 'Team Gale' and 'Team Peeta', which originates from the Twilight series, is constantly in war within this book as you would expect, however to me, this becomes tedious as Collins continues to make Katniss constantly swapping between the two.***SPOILERS ALERT***Eventually, Katniss chooses Peeta even after his ordeal with the Capitol. However, she is displayed as not loving him or the children they bear. To me this is ridiculous, a story's plot is followed by the main character - the plot is over throwing the Capitol and regaining power to oneselves and allowing oneself to make decisions about oneself and not having the Capitol make the decisions. Of course, the Capitol does fall but Katniss does not gain her independency but rather continues to allow herself be controlled by people around her. Example: President Snow manipulates her and controls her to kill the President of District 13. This is not right! She should gain some independence and make her own decisions, she should come out of the war and heal but she does not. Is Collins writing a political book about the effects of war or is this a young adults book where the character should not be so close to reality?***SPOILERS ENDED***The book is exceptionally moving in parts and can bring some to tears, however when you question why Collins did something, the answer is: "To hurt Katniss more". We see many deaths, however many of these are anonomous, for we do not know who most of the people who are dying are and therefore their deaths become pointless and meaningless (perhaps that is what she intended). There is a lack of characterisation in characters such as Gale, Peeta, Katniss, Prim and their mother and this makes it harder for the reader to empathise with them - something not seen in the previous books.However, despite all of this, I did give it a 5 star rating after all and I did so because it deserved it. It has a lot of action and makes you continue to read until you know exactly what happens, which I admit is perhaps unsatisfying to some but overall, I believe that even the people who rated it badly only did so out of spite for they didn't like the way that Katniss suffers and ***SPOILER ALERT*** doesn't truly recover. ***SPOILER ENDED***It is a must read and I would recommend it to anyone but it is not quite as good as the previous books but The Hunger Games and Catching Fire were absolutely outstanding.