Top critical review
3.0 out of 5 starsShoot the Editors with a Paper Bullet
Reviewed in India 🇮🇳 on 12 December 2020
The storyline is excellent as expected in the prequel to the series, but my ten-year old, who is crazy for Hunger Games, often finds it difficult to comprehend The Ballad.
When I checked the text, I realised the boy could not figure out things because the 'pronoun back-reference' is often not clear. Check chapter four of the book. One has to track back to know 'she' refers to the grandmother or the girl whom Coriolanus is going to receive at the railway station. (Sorry, I am not clear about the names as I have not read any of the books.)
I had to help out my son with the noun mentioned on the previous page (three paragraphs behind), even when the noun 'grandmother' had already occurred in between, which referred to the pronoun 'she'. Then, my son could make sense of the prose on the pages.
My son said, 'But the paragraph has changed, right? Why hasn't she repeated the name?' Poor boy!
Well, not Suzanne Collins' error. But, yeah, one should shoot the editor with a paper bullet made out of a style guide's page, as a punishment for confusing children.
