The Autobiography of Mark Twain Vol. 1; Hunger Games; Annotated Brothers Grimm; Room

I have read some real gems over the last two weeks. First up, "The Autobiography of Mark Twain Vol. 1", edited by Harriet Elinor Smith. I know I've said before that I don't like Twain's work, but really, I don't know what I was thinking. "The Prince and the Pauper" was one of my all time favorite books when I was growing up, my sister's too, so much so that when I moved she told me I could take all of our shared classic books except for that one because she wanted to keep it. I of course let her because honestly do I really need any more books to try to find room for? No, of course not. But anyway, back to Twain. The autobiography was a loose collection of letters, notes, and musings at first and then segued into his failed attempts to write a chronological account of his extraordinary life. It was witty and wry and very funny and I think now I'm ready (if I were to have the time to go back and reread "Tom Sawyer" and "Huckleberry Finn") to finally truly appreciate them.
"Hunger Games" by Suzanne Collins is the first in a trilogy. This was quite brilliant, it had a "Battle Royale" feel to it. Katniss Everdeen goes to represent her district in the 74th annual Hunger Games put on by the Capitol in the ruins of what used to be the U.S. The game pits 24 players against each other, and the last one standing gets to return home a wealthy hero. It was clever and well written and I hear they're making a movie about it to be released next year. With any luck I'll have read the second and third by then :)
"The Annotated Brothers Grimm", edited by Maria Tatar, collected some of the brothers more popular fairy tales together but she did leave out some, like the little mermaid and the little match girl. After discussing "Fables" I was eager to read some of the not Disney sanitized versions of the stories that Willingham used for his inspiration.
And finally, a book I literally stayed up all night to read because I could not bear to put it down, was "Room" by Emma Donoghue. Narrated by five year old Jack, it tells the story of a young woman and all she's done to make living in their tiny 11X11 foot room bearable for her young son. It's their prison, and she knows what's on the outside, if they could just escape their captor. To Jack, however, it's all he's ever known and it's home. It was a gripping and powerful story of motherly love and human survival instinct and I would highly recommend it.