fulfilment, I don’t think people will ever be tired of it.”
Geek Syndicate
The success of the first Hunger Games movie has paved the way for the other books in the trilogy to be adapted. The first of which is planned for release in August.
The same can be said for the Percy Jackson books written by author Rick Riordan. In the first book, the reader meets Percy, a troubled twelve-yearold diagnosed with both ADHD and dyslexia, who also has behavioural problems. Unknown to him though, his supernatural powers puts him in another league than that of his peers. Percy eventually discovers that he is a demigod and that he needs to save his mother from the underworld. As the first book and the subsequent books proved, so many young adults associate themselves with Percy. Still in school, frustrated by everyday problems, this young man manages to go on quests, change his destiny, rescues and protects his loved ones and discovers he is actually quite godlike – who wouldn’t want to be that!
Unlike Twilight, which was mainly aimed at girls and young women, The Hunger Games speak to men too. In Hollywood, it seems YA romance is out and battles between good and evil are in - particularly where the fate of the world depends on the actions of a young male or female. The “Hunger Games” is one such novel, from the pen of American television writer and novelist, Suzanne Collins, the novel centres around the world of a sixteen year-old girl, Katniss Everdeen. The Hunger Games are an annual event in which one boy and one girl aged between twelve and eighteen are selected by lottery to compete in a televised battle in which only one person can survive. Collins has revealed that she turned to Greek mythology and the historical Roman gladiatorial battles to provide the basis of the story.
Tough crowd?
Not every Hollywood adaptaptation of a YA book or series of novels has been successful though. “The Golden Compass”, “Inkheart”, “Jumper”, “Eragon” and “I am Number Four”, were all successful as novels, but their movies did not impress enough to warrant a sequel. Almost all of these movies had a stellar cast, but something was missing and they didn’t live up to the expectations of the fans of the books. The market has far from dried up, and the Young Adult audience has much to look forward to. The final movie in the Twilight series, “Breaking Dawn Part 2” will be released in the latter half of this year. There are also other adaptations, such as “The Mortal Instruments”, “Shiver”, “Just Listen” and “How I Live Now” currently in the process of being made. Holly Winnard is a freelance writer from England who specialises in finance writing and in particular analysing the interest on savings for major accounts in the UK. At heart, however, she never fully left her early twenties behind and still loves the young adult fiction genre today.
Take me far, far away…
“Young-adult literature is a genre that takes place at a specific time in your life when everything seems to be high stakes,” says Erik Feig, president of production at Lionsgate, the studio behind The Hunger Games and Twilight. “If you set stories in different worlds with unique protagonists and an element of wish
Holly WInnard
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