Hungry for more “Hunger Games”? There is plenty in store

There is, one character says, “no way to pretty up what follows”. Indeed. Nor is there any attempt to, as that might spoil the fun. By the end of the first chapter, a shot has rung out, causing one boy’s head to “explode”. A little later, a girl’s head cracks open on the floor (blood leaks onto her plait); then another is poisoned (“blood begins running from her eyes, her nose, her mouth”); a third girl’s eye is gouged from its socket (blood is everywhere). For the dramatic climax, the hero is disembowelled; for the romantic one, his beloved is poisoned and “blood-flecked foam bubbles up over her lips”.