Larry Brooks, the guy behind the brilliant Story Engineering guidebook, is doing a deconstruction (maybe analysis would be a better word) of The Hunger Games on his website at storyfix.com.

In case you haven’t heard of him, Brooks approaches novel-writing like an engineer (or maybe an architect). He puts things not only in artistic terms, but in terms of the essential structure and characteristics that all narratives must have if they’re going to be successful.

I’ve never seen a more practical, universal, and useful explanation of how novels really work. Story Engineering is written from a planner’s point of view, but (as Brooks himself has said), the method isn’t the point. If you’re a “pantser,” you can use his concept of story structure to eliminate a lot of unnecessary floundering; when you know what makes a good story tick behind the scenes, the parts can assemble themselves organically and they’ll actually work.

Anyway, I’m getting off track a bit.

My point is that right now you have the chance to see a great explanation not only of how a certain incredibly successful story works, but why it works.

Interesting stuff. Go check it out.