Now What? In Which Laura Finishes Catching Fire and Promises There Will Be No Spoilers

You all know about my Catching Fire woes. How I just couldn't bring myself to read it, even though I've been looking forward to it for ages. You have also read my list of possible reasons as to why I have not brought myself to read Catching Fire, even though its been a month (well, almost) since its release.

I figured it out, finally. I know why.

Turns out, I hate waiting.

I know what you're thinking. And I agree. Really, how could forcing myself to wait before reading a book make me not have to wait? It doesn't make sense.

Unless you take into consideration the sequel to Catching Fire. Have you figured it out yet?

However, a month of procrastination had brought me no closer to resolving the situation--i.e. I could not use my inability to start the book to force Suzanne Collins to have the third book released the moment I finished the second.

If only the world worked that way. Then I could read all the books in a series back to back. The would should work that way.

But it doesn't.

And Fire by Kristin Cashore (author of Graceling) was released on Monday. It only makes sense that I should have Catching Fire finished before getting Fire in the mail.

That is, after all, why I pre-ordered them both. So I could read them the second they came out, or the second they arrived in the mail.

Monday, I knew that Fire had been shipped. Wednesday I traced the USPS tracking number and discovered my package containing Fire would arrive on Friday (today).

Sigh.

It isn't like I didn't know this was coming. I had to read Catching Fire. I just had to. The Hunger Games was amazing, so good that I was telling all my friends to read it--and all of you! I am so rarely surprised by books. Usually I have this sixth sense that tells me the moment I touch them that I will love them--or not.

But I thought The Hunger Games would be depressing. And it wasn't. I thought I would hate all the characters and wish that their world would just end to save them from their misery. And I didn't! I loved them all! And I wanted them to throw off their evil government and escape, all the while thinking: This could happen! They could win!

Holding Catching Fire in my hands meant the resolution of some conflicts, the creation of more...and the knowledge that I would not have all my questions answered by the end of the novel. I knew that reading it would be the equivalent of reading Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. At the end the stage would be set, but I would have no idea if Harry--Katniss--came out alive. Or free.

I was walking through Books-A-Million about two weeks ago, and I saw Fire on their bookshelf. This is a super-big no-no.

See, booksellers are shipped boxes from publishing warehouses. Sometimes these boxes are filled with books that have yet to be released. These boxes are clearly marked, and they always have little notes inside them telling whoever opened them that they better seal them back up and wait, because if the date the stock person opened the box isn't the day the publisher told them to...bad things could happen.

So I could have bought Fire then.

But I didn't.

Why?

Catching Fire.

I knew my time was up.

Today, though, I ended my conflict once and for all.

I read Catching Fire today. Cover to cover.



Amazing.

That last chapter...

But I'm not saying anything. Go forth, read The Hunger Games, read Catching Fire, and while you're at it--read Graceling and Fire!

Then come talk to me. Because other than telling you I'm going to start biting my nails to kill the tension caused by not knowing what will happen in Book Three of The Hunger Games...I'm giving you nothing!