The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes

 The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins  517 pages

"It is the morning of the reaping that will kick off the tenth annual Hunger Games. In the Capital, eighteen-year-old Coriolanus Snow is preparing for his one shot at glory as a mentor in the Games. The once-mighty house of Snow has fallen on hard times, its fate hanging on the slender chance that Coriolanus will be able to outcharm, outwit, and outmaneuver his fellow students to mentor the winning tribute.

The odds are against him. He's been given the humiliating assignment of mentoring the female tribute from District 12, the lowest of the low. Their fates are now completely intertwined -- every choice Coriolanus makes could lead to favor or failure, triumph or ruin. Inside the arena, it will be a fight to the death. Outside the arena, Coriolanus starts to feel for his doomed tribute... and must weigh his need to follow the rules against his desire to survive no matter what it takes." (Goodreads)

This book really makes the most sense if you're already familiar with The Hunger Games series, although you could read it even without that backstory and knowledge and enjoy it. In this book, Collins gives us Snow, long before he became President Snow, and the story of how the Hunger Games developed.  I really liked this story and found it to be an engaging pageturner. Snow is a character that see as one way at the beginning, and then it seems like he's really going to develop into someone you want him to be . . . and then something happens.  Maybe he couldn't develop because he is who is he is at his very core? Food for thought.  While I felt parts of the story were a bit bloated and it definitely has some odd parts, I enjoyed it.  Probably because I liked the original series so getting some of this backstory was interesting.