I found it really interesting to see how many things in the world of The Hunger Games came to be. This is especially true for a lot of the songs that Katniss sings throughout the series. Reading this backstory was very entertaining to say the least, but not as enlightening as I would have hoped.

Spoilers ahead.

This book seemed unnecessarily long to me. After Lucy Gray wins the Hunger Games, I was so confused because I still had hours left on my audiobook. It’s not that it was boring or anything, it was just… long.

After the Hunger Games were over and Lucy Gray was able to return home, everything kind of dropped off from there. I was listening just to finish it to be honest. That’s not all, though.

The ending bothered the heck out of me. I mean, Snow spent all that time trying to save Lucy Gray, claiming to love her, risking his own life and future, and then just ends up trying to kill her? Excuse me? It felt so off in my opinion and it quite frankly made me mad. In my personal opinion, people are not born bad. They become bad. Snow was the type of character where you were kind of like, okay yeah, I get it, he lost his parents in the war, he’s poor. He seems like a decent guy, and hey he even fell in love with a District girl! Then poof, nope! Snow is actually horrible and tries to kill Lucy Gray. It felt so so so wrong as an ending. I know that he had to become bad because, I mean… The Hunger Games, but that just didn’t seem like the way to do it. I was expecting someone to kill Lucy Gray and pretend that she betrayed him therefore ruining his trust in anyone who is from the Districts.

Okay, rant over. I think.

Other than that, I really did enjoy this book. I just choose to not acknowledge its ending and make my own in my head.

What did you guys think about The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes?

Source: Audiobook from Audible