11 Errors in The Hunger Games (Books)

Don't get me wrong, I love "The Hunger Games" trilogy and believe the stories are great. This is however also the reason why all the errors upset me. 

To be a good writer you don't need 'just' a good story but you also need an eye for detail and sometimes is means to painstakingly comb trough your own story to eliminate flaws, no matter if they involve grammar and syntax, characters acting ilogical, plot holes or continuity errors. 

"The Hunger Games" trilogy  is full of them and because of these errors instead of being an incredible book it seems like a wasted oportunity. 

Of course you can ask how a non published writer dares criticizing a bestselling author. Well, just read my list and you might decide if I am right and by the way: Once my book is out I welcome all the detailed analysis as it will help me improve my writing. 

1. Repetition: In each of the books she keeps repeating "he says", "she says", "Peeta says" etc. Wasn't anybody else bothered by this? What happened to verbs like: yell, mutter, answer, respond, remark or comment? I am not even a native speaker and those are just the ones that come to mind in the first 30 seconds. It can be challenging to avoid to many repetions but it is worth it and actually a must for any writer to avoid boredome even in the most trivial scenes. 
2. Character mistake: When Katniss storms into the clearing and Marvel is waiting for her, he spears first Rue. For someone who was supposedly trained for the Hunger Games this is a crucial error. You always aim for the dangerous oponent first. Rue was already incapacitated and unarmed, while Katniss was armed. Why would Marvel spear Rue, which left him unarmed against Katniss? A trained soldier, which is basically what the careers are meant to be would never make such a mistake. 
3. General mistake: Why don't more people train their kids? I get it, not eveybody has a bow and arrows, but every household has knives. If you knew there was a real possibility of your kids being reaped wouldn't you make sure they have the best chance possible? 
4. Character mistake: Why doesn't Katniss keep the knives she takes off Marvel? She says she is not bad throwing knives and additional knives should come in handy anyhow. I understand why she doesn't take the spear, although she states she isn't too bad throwing it. I would have however stated that she didn't want it because it had taken Rue's life. But that is not a mistake, just some personal taste. 
5. General mistake: What if for the Quarter Quell there would have been a district without a male or female victor? It is merely stated that all districts have scraped up enough victors but it seems a pretty important detail to be left to coincidence. Especially since the envelope could have been drawn already for the 25th games, meaning there would have been exactly 24 previous victors. This could have been easily solved by adding a sentence to the reading by the president, e.g. if no victor is available the will be reaped from the blood relatives of the victors. 
6. Continuity error: The Lake. When we first meet Katniss and Gale they are in the woods and then decided that they will go fishing at the lake. In some later chapters however Katniss mentiones that she never shared the location of the lake with Gale, she even has to leave him a clue later to guide him there. Since only ever one lake is mentioned we have to assume it is supposed to be the same lake. At yet again another point she remembers teaching him to swim before the games. 
7. Logical error: School. In early chapter Katniss states that most of what they learn is school is coal related and one can assume that the rest is something like basic math. However she knows that pearls grow in shell fish. This seems like something you would only learn in a detailed biology class, considering that district 12 is not even close to the sea it appears highly unlikely. 
8. Plothole. District 6 main industry is transportation yet for some reason both its victors are addicted to morphling and specialists in camouflage. This seems pretty random and unlikely. Wouldn't the winners of district 11 be more likely camouflage experts? Or the one from district 1? After all district 1 makes luxury items and cosmetics most likely fall under this.
9. Plothole: Mag's death. A lot has been written about the Fog in "Catching Fire", but what really bothers me is Mag's death. Let's take a look at the facts: Mag's is a victor of one of the first games. This means she is a survivor and she has witnessed most likely in one way or another all games. In addition she probably knows the  stategies of the game makers best and knew (just like Katniss) that the fog would be limited to a certain area of the arena. It is also stated that when going slow she can in fact walk. Just before she kills herself of the group stops and there is time for an exchange about how Katniss can't continue carrying her and some more. This exchange based on the dialogue should take around two minutes. This means that they already had a certain distance to the fog. First of all: Why do they waste time instead of continuing as fast as they can? Instead they just stop to argue! Then we have Mags walking into the fog? Why wouldn't she try to outwalk it? The outcome might have been the same but she could have made it. It seems unlikely that someone who is strong enough to sacrifice oneself for other wouldn't fight until the last minute. 
10. Continuity error: Katniss' shirt. At the end of "The Hunger Games", when Peeta has been injured by the mutts, Katniss takes off her jacket to remove her shirt and make a tourniquette with it on Peeta after putting her jacket back on. Later she wipes her tounge on her shirt and we must assume she is supposed to be wearing it, cause the alternative would be just gross. 
11. Plothole: Shoulder roll. When Katniss is performing for the game makers, at one points she shoulder rolls forward and comes up at one knee and then shoots. While this makes indeed for a handy skill during a fight, one has to wonder: Why would a hunter know how to perform such a move? It doesn't make any sense at all for her to know such a move unless she would have secretely trained for the games, however this was never mentioned before and she never states that she trained anything like it during the games. 

Some people consider Haymitch's strategies in the games and Peeta's camouflage skills errors. In this respect I disagree. During "Catching Fire" the reader learns about Haymitch's games and how he won by using the force field against the final competitor. This is clear indicator that his intelligence is way above average. Other signs are the fact that he is one of the leaders of the rebellion without the capitol or even those closest to him even suspecting. 

As to Peeta's painting skills coming from the cake decorating art this is somewhat fussy. One could argument that cake decorating is not enough to give him these skills, however it could very well help him gain experience  regarding texture and colours. Add to this a natural talent and observatory skill and it seems definetely possible. 

Despite all these errors "The Hunger Games" books are amazing stories and their world is truly engaging. Maybe one day we can get an edited version of the books or maybe additonal stories. Personally I have learnt from this experience how important a good editor is to create a unique book.