In the ruins of a place once known as North America lies the nation of Panem, a shining Capital surrounded by twelve outlying districts. The Capital is harsh and cruel and keeps the districts in libe by forcing them all to send one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen to participate in the annual Hunger Games, a fight to the death on live TV.

Sixteen-year-old Karniss Everdeen, who lives alone with her mother and younger sister, regards it as a death sentence wheh she steps forward to take her sister's place in the Games. But Katniss has been close to dead before and survival, for her, is second nature to win, she will have to start making choices that weight survived against humanity and life against love.

Acclaimed writer Suzzane Collins, author of The New York Times bestselling Underland Chronicles, delivers equal parts suspense and philosophy, adventures and romance, in this searing novel set in a future wiht unsettling parallels to our present. Suzanne Collins is the author of the bestselling Underland Chronicles, which started with Gregor the Overlander. In The Hunger Games, she continues to explore the effects of war of violence on those coming of age, Suzanne lives with her family in Connecticut.