We all know that when the Hunger Games series first came out, it was a smash hit and spawned dozens of copycats, many of which (Divergent, the Maze Runner, the Selection, etc.) simply appropriated the aesthetic and didn't engage with the themes. In honor of Sunrise on the Reaping, I'd like to share some lesser-known book recs that honor the spirit of the Hunger Games, although they don't necessarily have similar plots.
• Firebreak by Nicole Kornher-Stace. This is one of my favorite books, and it's criminally underrated. It follows a young woman in the twenty-second century trying to stay alive in a city ravaged by a corporate civil war who accidentally becomes drawn into investigated a conspiracy. It engages with themes like the entertainment-industrial complex and parasociality, as well as corporate control and war for profit.
•We Set The Dark On Fire by Tehlor Kay Mejia. In this Latinx-influenced dystopian fantasy, a young woman, secretly an undocumented immigrant, is forced to marry a powerful man and becomes a spy for the resistance. It explores themes of wealth inequality, immigration rights, authoritarianism, and peaceful vs. violent revolution.
•Metaltown by Kristen Simmons. A dystopian with steampunk flavoring which tells the story of a labor rights movement through the eyes of three teenage narrators; two factory workers and a wealthy heiress. This one discusses the capitalist mode of production, worker's rights, war profiteering and foreign policy, and class warfare.
•Lifestyles of Gods and Monsters by Emily Roberson. A retelling of the Greek myth of Theseus and the Minotaur with a reality TV twist. It deals with entertainment and celebrity culture, the exploitation of children (especially girls) in media, and the commodification of women in the entertainment industry.
•Solis by Paola Mendoza and Abby Sher. This is a near-future dystopian and a companion to Sanctuary by the same authors, although it can be read separately. It follows four young women, three prisoners in a labor camp trying to survive and one a member of a resistance group trying to free them. It talks about propaganda, the scapegoating of vulnerable groups, the prison-industrial complex, and the slippery slope into authoritarianism.
•Fable For the End of the World by Ava Reid. I haven't read this one yet, but I've heard good things. It follows two young women in a livestreamed assassination spectacle, one the hunter and one the hunted. Some key themes are poverty and debt cycles, for-profit healthcare, and of course, the romanticization of violence in media.
