I'm about to read the "Hunger Games" in Spanish!
I recently went to Barnes & Noble and picked up a copy of Los Juegos del Hambre, the Hunger Games in Spanish.
I'm looking forward to reading this and practicing my reading comprehension. I've read the Hunger Games in English a couple times, so I'm familiar with the story; I think that'll help with understanding the Spanish.
Any suggestions/ideas that can help me get the most out of the book?
9 Answers
Any suggestions/ideas that can help me get the most out of the book?
Keep a dictionary and a note pad nearby to make a list of new vocabulary. You will really appreciate the list later even though it slows your reading.
If you get the book on Kindle you can chose a Spanish dictionary and any word you hover your cursor over the meaning pops up...how cool is that!!
Read aloud sometimes. You'll be surprised how hard it is, but it's great practice for when you need to speak in real life.
Enjoy the books!!
Well I finally read Los juegos del hambre so I figured I should post my thoughts. I was a bit hesitant to read it because I had it in my mind that a book taking place in the future and that seemed to have a dystopian and/or post-apocalyptic theme would be more difficult to read than the average young adult book. Also, based on the title of the last book in the series I figured that the story probably used some made up words. I compared the Spanish and English Wikipedia pages on The Hunger Games Universe to learn some of these made up words but there were spoilers on the pages and it was unnecessary because the words were well explained in the book.
I read the book in about 3 days. For me the story was easy to understand and compelling, but not so great that I felt I was missing out because I didn't understand every single word. It was one of the easier books I've read in Spanish but since I've read a lot in Spanish I'm not sure if I would have found it as easy a year ago. I look forward to finishing the series in Spanish.
Just a tip- like Harry Potter, there are a lot of vocabulary list/flash card sets on the internet for the Spanish version of this book (especially on this site and quizlet.com). To get a head start on words that might have caused me trouble I looked through these lists to learn words that I didn't know before I started reading.
I like to read the Harry Potter books in Spanish. I used to get them at a public library, but now I buy them so that I can underline any words that I might want to look up later. I find it much easier than stopping to write down the word.
Hola Azabache, how long had you been studying Spanish before you were able to read your first book without having to look up almost every word?
Gracias and enjoy the book!
I read the hunger games series in Spanish, and I found it to be very enjoyable. It is written in a somewhat unusual style (mostly in the first person) with a great deal of scene description and internal thoughts on emotions and motivations. You might find these pasages a little challenging, but it is well worth he effort.
All the previous suggestions are very good. My only addition is not to let he words get in the way of the story. It's easy to get bogged down by trying to have perfect comprehension.
I remember reading The Alchemist in Spanish when mine was pretty basic. I'd imagine that as it is a kids' book (young adult literature, whatever) that there might be a parallel to draw there...
Last year I tried to read it and failed- I had seen the movie and read it in English, but my Spanish just wasn't strong enough. I could always tell what scene it was, but a lot got by me. I may try again in the future since it has been a while since I tried to read it last, and I study every day. Before this I've only read folk tales, newspaper articles, and kid's books successfully.
Let us know how it goes. I have a plan to read all of the super popular young adult books that never caught my attention (Harry Potter, Twilight, Hunger Games, etc.) in Spanish. Since I don't know the story I'm curious to see how understandable you think the Spanish translation is.
I didn't have much of a problem with HP but Twilight gave me a bit of trouble until I read some humorous 'cliff notes' along with the book and realized that Edward is just really contradictory, haha.
Remember to post your future practice exercises in both English and Spanish.
This will help both our Spanish learners and our English learners.
When you have a question try to keep your questions to a few sentences or a short paragraph. By doing this you will receive more feedback.
