The bulk of the book is fast
How is the book?
Katniss is sixteen, but she has yet to experience the slightest intimacy beyond a familial kiss. As the oldest child in the family, she is tasked with the unenviable job of providing for her mother and younger sister when her father perishes in a mining accident. Set in the near future, most residents of Pan-Am are forced to subsist through utter capitulation to the Capitol's whims. The only ways out are to break the law and hunt outside the district (which carries a capital sentence), or prove victorious in the annual Hunger Games.Being forced to live off the land for years, pairing her natural talent for archery with Gale's instinct for setting snares, they eke out a comfortable, if arduous, existence in District 12. Until Katniss' sister Prim is chosen for the Hunger Games, despite only having one slip with her name in the Reaping. I expect this "coincidence" to play a prominent role in the following two books.The bulk of the book is fast-paced, with occasional flashbacks to Katniss' past, and how she seems to be the only lady in the family without a talent or desire for treating the sick and injured. Although she has her father's talent for calling out to the Mockingjays, she chooses not to do so, preferring the practical and more immediate fruits of hunting and gathering.The Games themselves are never dull (particularly because the Game Masters can't afford to rely on nature and the killer instincts of the contestants to whittle down the numbers). Any tribute who gets complacent or is lucky enough to enjoy a cushy half-day or two is immediately beset by traps, lack of resources, or anything else that could lie in store for them (including genetically engineered killing machines). They know their lives are not held in high esteem by the Capitol, and the only way to increase one's chances of survival is to appeal to one's sponsors, a task that becomes exponentially more difficult the longer the Games continue, and the more delirious the betting becomes.The Hunger Games is excellently written and paced, and while Katniss' introspective analyses of her personality, her emotions and her life can get tedious at times, it doesn't adversely affect the experience overall. It soon becomes apparent that while Katniss is unfamiliar and uneasy with the concepts of romance and love, she still has a firm grasp on her humanity. Love has been abandoned, alone in her soul, but it is far from dead. A sense of duty, obligation and debt has replaced it, and she hates being in anyone's debt (although she soon learns that this is sometimes unavoidable, and some debts can never be repaid, at least not in the conventional sense). 