How to write a successful novel sequel — Hunger Games 2: Catching Fire (Part 1) by Suzanne Collins

So let’s analyze how world-famous mega-successful writer Suzanne Collins did it for her Hunger Games series. Might come in handy for those of us interested in writing our own stories, sequels, trilogies, and series ~

This is Part 1 of our Hunger Games: Catching Fire (Book 2) dissection-analysis for writers who want to hone their craft!

• Part 2: Coming soon
• Part 3: Coming soon
• And you can check out the deep-dive analysis of Book 1 in the series, here: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

Who this book is for: Fans of action-adventure, dystopian with a dash of romance, fans of Roman culture reconfigured with a modern spin, survival stories (both physical and emotional survival), and anyone interested in learning to be a better storyteller.

Scylighter rating: given at the end of Part 3.

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BOOK NOTES

PART I: “The Spark”

Chapter 1

In This Chapter

• Katniss hunts and reflects on the fallout from the events of book one
• Love triangle ramps up (sort of)

Months after the events of the first book, Katniss is out in the woods, thinking morosely about the upcoming Victory Tour, a part of her duties as a victor in last book’s Hunger Games.

There’s a brief description of what the Victory Tour is — a midyear journey that victors have to endure, celebrating their win, “the Capitol’s way of keeping the horror fresh and immediate.”

Katniss thinks that although she’s been in the woods, she hasn’t been hunting this day because her family no longer needs the extra meat. Her win has allowed them to live much better than they used to. But Katniss still hunts because Gale’s family needs the meat, and Gale can’t hunt for it because he’s now working in the mines.

(Aside from the Hunger Games being designed for children, this is another reason why Katniss can’t be too old. Because if she was 18 or more, that would make Gale in his twenties, easily, and then he would already be working in the mines since Book 1, and not available as her hunting partner…

(…Yet Katniss can’t be too young, either, otherwise the whole romance angle wouldn’t work so well, especially since — spoiler — she is supposed to get engaged later on in this book. So 16 is just right-slash-pushing-it, depending on your point of view. Although technically she’s 17 now.)

Katniss thinks of how stifling the mines are for Gale, who is most himself only when he’s in the woods.

“I don’t know how he stands it. Well…yes, I do. He stands it because it’s the way to feed his mother and two younger brothers and sister. And here I am with buckets of money, far more than enough to feed both our families now, and he won’t take a single coin.”

(District 12 has a really interesting honor code. But it also makes sense, because this WAS — and still is — the spirit of many poor people, at least in certain communities in America’s past. I can’t necessarily speak for other countries. 

(There used to be a certain kind of pride in working for your keep, and shame in taking handouts, which is why people DIDN’T take handouts, not even from friends, not even when offered. And not even when NOT taking handouts really hurt. That seems to have changed a lot nowadays with the welfare state culture.)

Katniss still meets with Gale on Sundays to hunt, but notes that “it’s not like it used to be before, when we could tell each other anything. The Games have spoiled even that…There’s no going back.”

Katniss traps a few animals and then returns to her old house to change her clothes. It’s her old house now because she and her mom and sister have moved into their new house in the Victor’s Village.

While she’s there, Katniss hears Buttercup wailing at the back door and she gives him a little beaver fat and even pets him, even as she says: “You’re hideous, you know that, right?”

(Katniss’ attitude toward Prim’s cat is kind of funny, but also kind of sadly realistic. In places where people are hand-to-mouth-poor, they really don’t have the luxury of having pets. They can’t see animals as family, but only as work animals or food sources. Katniss demonstrates this attitude realistically)

Katniss then goes to drop off the game at Gale’s house, thinking about Gale’s mother Hazelle and how she survived after the mine accident that killed her husband (and Katniss’ father at the same time).

While chatting with Hazelle, Katniss offers to teach Gale’s little brother Rory to hunt, and Hazelle nods, saying that Gale would have done it, but his only free days are Sundays “and I think he likes saving those for you.”

Which makes Katniss blush, as she notes how Hazelle “knows the bond I share with Gale” and thinks “plenty of people assumed that we’d eventually get married even if I never gave it any thought.”

But of course, that was all before the Games forced her to pair up with Peeta romantically in order to survive in the arena. “Only it wasn’t just a strategy for Peeta. I’m not sure what it was for me.”

And she knows by now that “it was nothing but painful for Gale” and also feels uncomfortable thinking how “Peeta and I will have to present ourselves as lovers again” for the Victory Tour.

(And here we go. Love triangle chugging on full cylinders. It was only hinted at in Book 1, because Gale wasn’t even present for most of the story, but he’s really going to pull his full weight as Second Lead in this second book)

Next, Katniss heads to the “full-time black market” at the Hob, to spend her money, spreading out the purchases and picking up some white liquor from Ripper, a one-armed woman who’d survived a mine accident.

The liquor, of course, is for her favorite (that’s sarcastic, btw) alcoholic mentor, Haymitch. Because “no matter who Haymitch is, I owe him” because “he did his job — more than his job — becuase for the first time in history, two tributes were allowed to win.”

Why does Katniss need to buy Haymitch liquor, though?

Apparently a few weeks ago, he ran out and had awful withdrawal symptoms, “shaking and screaming at terrifying things only he could see.”

Katniss thinks:

“He scared Prim to death and, frankly, it wasn’t much fun for me to see him like that, either.”

(It’s kind of heartwarming how Katniss has created a “found family,” of sorts, with Haymitch becoming like that eccentric uncle whom everyone pretends to tolerate, but deep down actually loves. 

(Plus, it’s kind of fun to think that Prim knows Haymitch, now, and being the softhearted girl she is, as well as knowing that Haymitch helped save her big sister, probably is fond of him, too. 

(And note how Prim is still Katniss’ best motivation — although in this case, it may be a bit of an excuse. She’s buying the alcohol for Haymitch to spare him the agony of alcohol withdrawal, but she excuses it by saying it’s for her beloved little sister Prim’s sake.)

Head Peacekeeper Cray sees Katniss with the bottle and frowns, but Katniss dismisses it by claiming her mother uses it in medicine. When Katniss goes to Greasy Sae’s stall for some soup and bumps into Peacekeeper Darius, who is “one of [her] favorites,” young, and not pushy, with “red hair that sticks out every which way, [giving] him a boyish quality.”

Darius teases her about her (not-Capitol-ready) looks and then heads off with his bowl of soup while Greasy Sae makes a comment about Gale being Katniss’ “cousin.”

(These interactions with Hazelle and the people in the Hob aren’t just great worldbuilding and a slice-of-life for readers to see what life really is like in District 12, “normally,” but it’s a great setup for Book 2. 

(In Book 1, the biggest issue was keeping main character Katniss alive so that she could return to her family. Her life was the main thing at stake that readers cared about. In book 2, we need to go bigger. It’s not just about Katniss, now. So we need to see the other people in her world, the characters in District 12, we need to start caring about them as the story expands to touch on political issues)

Greasy Sae’s comment is the perfect segue into Katniss explaining how the Capitol created the lie of Gale being Katniss’ “cousin” in order to not have to explain why Katniss has a handsome, unrelated guy friend during the obligatory interviews that the Hunger Games film team did with the family and friends of the final eight.

Katniss’ description of Gale: “He was too handsome, too male, and not the least bit willing to smile and play nice for the cameras.”

(Ha!)

Finally, Katniss can delay no longer. She heads back home to the Victor’s Village, explaining for the reader’s benefit how the Village works, with its twelve houses, mostly empty until she and Peeta moved in.

Katniss heads to Haymitch’s place first, bracing herself for the mess that he keeps his living quarters in. She finds him in an alcoholic stupor and wakes him by dumping ice water on him. Haymitch jumps up, waving a knife around wildly before he fully regains consciousness.

“What are you doing?” he sputters.

“You told me to wake you an hour before the cameras come,” I say.

“What?” he says.

“Your idea,” I insist.

He seems to remember. “Why am I all wet?”

“I couldn’t shake you awake,” I say. “Look, if you wanted to be babied, you should have asked Peeta.”

“Asked me what?” Just the sound of his voice twists my stomach into a knot of unpleasant emotions like guilt, sadness, and fear. And longing. I might as well admit there’s some of that, too. Only it has too much competition to ever win out.”

(I quoted this entire passage because it’s a great example of excellent dialogue writing. It’s funny, despite the dire tone of this world and the story that’s going on, and it brings both Haymitch and Peeta on stage perfectly, from Katniss’ perspective — it tells us how she sees and feels about both characters, which is the main thing readers care about. 

(Side notes: I love Katniss’ interactions with Haymitch. These two really are peas in a pod — prickly, survivors, grumpyfaces [my own term] with hearts of sorta-gold. This makes them very likely to get into all kinds of conflicts with each other, while at the same time understanding and caring about each other deep down. The whole dynamic is fun for readers. 

(And Peeta’s “speak of the devil” arrival “on stage,” so to speak is also pretty “chef’s kiss.” Even if you haven’t read or don’t remember the last book, the way his introduction is framed, just from Katniss’ thoughts about him in the beginning of the chapter, amps up the anticipation for when the character himself will finally show up. That way, Peeta’s unexpected appearance here works super well.

(Finally, there’s some dramatic irony in the last line “longing…Only it has too much competition to ever win out.” Those who have read the third book — “never say never, Katniss”)

Peeta takes the knife from Haymitch, cleans it with white liquor, and uses it to slice the bread he’s brought over.

(Good reminder of Peeta’s role, thematically — he’s the boy with the bread. The baker’s son who saved Katniss’ life with bread as a child, and then later helps save her in the Games. Bread = nourishing, warm, sustaining life. Which is all what Peeta is, too.)

Katniss and Peeta are stiff and awkward with each other, and Haymitch comments that they “have got a lot of warming up to do before showtime.” Because that’s what the audience is going to be expecting.

Katniss just tells Haymitch to take a bath, and then lets herself out the window (The window?! Why? What’s wrong with using the door?) and goes home.

She’s greeted by her mother, acting oddly, and Katniss quickly figures out why — President Snow has decided to pay her a visit.

Comments & Analysis

Opening: I clasp the flask between my hands even though the warmth from the tea has long since leached into the frozen air.

Closing: I’m staring into the snakelike eyes of President Snow.

PROMISES & PAYOFFS

Promises:

• We will find out why President Snow has unexpectedly dropped in, and it won’t be something good.
• Katniss and Peeta will have to get over their stiff awkwardness with each other.
• Katniss will have to work out which boy she wants, Gale or Peeta.

Payoffs:

• We finally get to see (sort of, via second-hand report from Katniss) how Gale felt about her on-screen romance with Peeta during the Games.

Complications:

• Mainly Katniss herself, at this point. She’s got all she wanted in the first book — namely, surviving the games, and saving Peeta too, while she was at it — and her life is better in some ways (little sister no longer in danger of starvation), but the same or worse in others (no longer has a great easy friendship with Gale).

OTHER COMMENTS

• Interesting opening line. It’s a great tone setup, with the “warmth of the tea…long since leached into the frozen air,” similar to how Katniss’ innocence (what little she had) and peace of mind has long since been leached away by the trauma she suffered in Book 1.
• Also, there’s a lot more flashbacking and recounting of the semi-recent past in this chapter (telling, rather than showing). In any other writer’s hands, this could be rather boring, but Collins handles this fairly well, by relating information that is actually interesting and makes readers want to keep reading.

Chapter 2

In This Chapter

• Katniss is kissed (in a flashback)
• Katniss is threatened (with her loved ones’ deaths)

Katniss recognizes immediately that President Snow’s presence in her house means trouble. And she knows why: “because I outsmarted his sadistic Hunger Games, made the Capitol look foolish, and consequently undermined his control.”

(See, the thing is, I still don’t see why they couldn’t have just let Katniss and Peeta kill themselves and go without victors for a year…aside from plot armor and story reasons, that is)

Snow opens by saying: “I think we’ll make this whole situation a lot simpler by agreeing not to lie to each other, what do you think?”

And Katniss agrees. Snow says he knows Katniss doesn’t plan to be “difficult” given how hard she tried to survive, and how many people she needs to protect.

And then President Snow kind of answers my question: “If the Head Gamemaker, Seneca Crane, had had any brains, he’d have blown you to dust right then. But he had an unfortunate sentimental streak. So here you are. Can you guess where he is?”

(Note his naming Seneca Crane and saying his title “Head Gamemaker” to clue in readers who missed the first book somehow and/or forgot it)

Obviously, Snow is insinuating that Seneca Crane has been executed, and Katniss knows this, nodding as she notes the growing smell of blood and roses that Prez Snow gives off.

Snow says that Katniss “love-crazed schoolgirl bit” was convincing enough for the people in the Capitol, but not so much those in the districts. They started thinking “if a girl from District Twelve of all places can defy the Capitol and walk away unharmed, what is to stop them from doing the same? What is to prevent, say, an uprising?”

Katniss asks if there have been any uprisings, and Snow says, not yet, but they’re coming if things don’t change, and do you know how destructive uprisings will be, how many people will die, and how the country will be ruined, etc., etc?

(He’s not wrong, because that IS the playbook most despots and tyrants use and have used to keep people in line — if you defy me, you will devolve into chaos and even MORE people will die compared to the few people I have to kill in order to keep the peace, and so on and so forth)

Katniss finds herself “taken aback by the directness and even the sincerity of this speech, as if Snow truly cares first and foremost for the citizens’ well-being, when she knows “nothing could be further from the truth.”

(Well, see, the thing is, a lot of these despotic types actually DO delude themselves into thinking that they’re doing it “for the good of the people.” 

(That’s why C.S. Lewis said: “Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies.”

(They’ve lied to themselves and to others so much that they start buying their own delusions. Not sure if Snow is this type, exactly — he’s at least halfway there, at least, it seems. 

(By the way, kids, this is why truth is so important. And free speech as well, allowing even for speech that seems “hateful” or “unpleasant.”)

Katniss’ mother delivers some tea and cookies, and after she leaves, Katniss asks the questions readers are wondering: “Why don’t you just kill me now?”

Publicly, Snow says, that would only “add fuel to the flames.” And “arranging an accident” would be too suspicious.

When Snow asks about the cookies and Katniss reveals they were made by Peeta, he asks “How is the love of your life?” and “At what point did he realize the exact degree of your indifference?”

(A little bit of dramatic irony here, because Snow wasn’t there, but the readers definitely were, when at the end of the first book, Peeta finds out Katniss was mostly acting for the cameras and doesn’t really care about him the way he hoped she did. 

(Also — is Snow just a good reader of character, or is Peeta that transparent? It’s that clear to everyone that he loves for real and Katniss is just faking it?)

Then Snow brings up Gale, and when Katniss has a hard time finding her words, Snow says: “Speak, Miss Everdeen. Him I can easily kill off if we don’t come to a happy resolution. You aren’t doing him a favor by disappearing into the woods with him each Sunday.”

Which makes him even creepier, because now readers and Katniss both know that Snow has been following her every move.

And this brings up a memory that Katniss has, a few weeks after returning home, when she finally has a chance to meet Gale on on one in the woods. After hugging him, crying, Katniss and Gale hunt, and at the end of it, Gale suddenly kisses her and says “I had to do that. At least once.”

(And…ramp up that love triangle to a 12)

Katniss was confused by the whole thing, especially compared to all the kissing she’s been having to do with Peeta, and the next time she meets Gale, he acts as if it never happened. But unfortunately, “any hope I had of resuming our old, uncomplicated friendship” is shattered.

Katniss asks Snow not to hurt Gale, saying she will be “just as in love” with Peeta on the tour as she was in the arena, and convince everyone her actions in the arena were not due to defiance but love-crazed insanity.

Snow tells her to “convince me,” and then makes his way out, but not before a parting: “By the way, I know about the kiss.”

(Well, the timing of this comment is apropos, considering Katniss just had a flashback about this exact incident right before this.)

Comments & Analysis

Opening: In my mind, President Snow should be viewed in front of marble pillars hung with oversized flags.

Closing: I don’t watch him as he heads for the door, so I flinch when he whispers in my ear. “By the way, I know about the kiss.” Then the door clicks shut behind me.

PROMISES & PAYOFFS

Promises:

• Snow’s line “I think we’ll make this…simpler by agreeing not to lie to each other” is an intriguing promise to have between the protagonist and antagonist and will come into play again later.

Payoffs:

• We get to see how the head honcho himself — the evil Prez Snow — thinks and feels about what Katniss did in the Games

Complications:

• Snow wants to end the discontent Katniss has fanned into flames, and makes Katniss want the same thing by threatening the lives of her loved ones…but simply killing her isn’t going to help, and making her try to convince the country that she “simply acted out of love for Peeta” is a long shot.

OTHER COMMENTS

• Okay, it might just be me, but that last line jars me out of suspension-of-reality a bit. Like, really. The tyrannical “president” of a seriously messed up society is even paying attention to (much less pointing out) who kisses a teenage girl? Even if that girl IS a rather important pawn in his games?
• And calling it “the kiss” is a bit too vague, as well. Even though based on the context of this story and the way it’s framed, we know what he’s talking about, but still…
• I get the point is to deliver the message that “I am always watching” and to be creepy, but it’s just a bit too unbelievable for me. It could just be me, though.

Chapter 3

In This Chapter

• Katniss’ prep team scolds her for her eyebrows.
• Katniss returns to faking “in love” with Peeta for the cameras.

Katniss lies to her mother about President Snow’s visit to not worry her.

My mother’s face floods with relief. “Oh. I thought there was some kind of trouble.”

“No, not at all,” I say. “The trouble will start when my prep team seees how I’ve let my eyebrows grow back in.”

(Katniss says this line quickly and easily to soothe her mother, showing how quick on her feet she is when it comes to protecting her loved ones. 

(But actually, this is strong writing on the author’s part, writing a mildly humorous comment that does multiple things at once — show Katniss’ cleverness, also her care for her mother, and also hinting at her relationship with her rather shallow prep team, as well as the importance of appearances in this world)

Katniss thinks about how since she’s been home, she has been trying to mend her relationship with her mother, letting her do things for her that she’s rejected for years.

“My time in the arena made me realize how I needed to stop punishing her for something she couldn’t help, specifically the crushing depression she fell into after my father’s death. Because something things happen to people and they’re not equipped to deal with them.”

(Although the Games were horrific, this is the silver lining: Katniss has developed as a character from someone single-mindedly focused just on survival — which made her rather judgmental or at least neglectful of others’ non-survival-related needs — into someone who has learned to be more compassionate and understanding)

As Katniss bathes in preparation to meet her makeup team, she runs through her mental rolodex of people she can confide in about this latest complication, and realizes the only one suitable is Haymitch. “As my mentor in the Games it was his duty to keep me alive. I only hope he’s still up for the job.”

(Oh boy, will he need to be. Not just for this incident, but for the rest of the book, as we shall see — not soon, but it’s coming)

Katniss thinks about swimming in the lake in the woods, the lake her father brought her too when he was teaching her to hunt. She thinks about how she never showed Gale the lake because she wanted to keep it to her memories of her father.

(Unbeknownst to readers at this point in the story, there’s a tiny bit of foreshadowing here. Just one important bit of information — Katniss knows how to swim, and that will come in handy for her later. Clever of Collins to slip that in, in the middle of a flashback that most readers will simply interpret as character/backstory-building)

Katniss comes out of her bath and sees her prep team. Of course, the first thing they exclaim over is the state of her eyebrows (showing how her flippant comment to calm her mother earlier wasn’t completely facetious. They really do care about her eyebrows to an excessive degree).

The prep team chatter like birds as they prepare Katniss, gossiping about how, since this is the 75th year of Hunger Games, it’s a Quarter Quell (nice alliteration, by the way), which Katniss explains in narrative to be a special type of Games that takes place every 25 years. The last Quell was when Haymitch won his games, Katniss notes, but she doesn’t remember seeing any replays of his particular games.

(There’s a reason for this, of course, as we will learn later).

Prepped, Katniss goes downstairs to see Cinna waiting for her, and she narrates how she’s been talking to him quite a bit lately, because apparently all the Victors need to have a “talent” to occupy themselves after they win the Games.

Peeta is naturally good at art — painting, specifically — but Katniss has no hobbies or talents besides hunting, and that would not be appropriate to brin up, so she’s been pretending to be working on “fashion,” with Cinna secretly supplying all the actual designs and drawings.

As Cinna sets up, Katniss skims his sketchbook and examines “a dress I supposedly created.”

“You know, I think I show a lot of promise,” she says, and Cinna retorts jokingly, “Get dressed, you worthless thing,” throwing her clothes at her.

Cinna also hands Katniss a stack of note cards to prepare her for the filming of her “fashion design talent”:

“You’ll read these off camera while they’re filming the clothes. Try to sound like you care.”

(Haha. This is a running joke at this point, how Katniss is horrifically bad at acting. Which is kind of ironic in two ways:

(First, because throughout the last book, she thinks she’s faking feelings for Peeta in the arena to save both their lives. [This, by the way, is a hint to readers that she’s not faking as much as she thinks she is]. 

(Second, because although Katniss can’t bring herself to fake emotions she doesn’t really feel…at the same time, she is extremely aware of what it takes to win the Games, by winning over the hearts of the fickle audience watching her — playing up the romance, saying the right things to the ever-present cameras at the right time, etc. She does have her own gift of understanding how showbiz works, and that’s partly why she survives the Games)

Cinna gives Katniss earmuffs, which Katniss notes mentally that she hates, ever since she was blasted half-deaf in the arena — although the Capitol has repaired her ear.

(Super convenient. Also a reminder that the Capitol is magically good at anything health-related. Which makes sense with the whole muttation and Tracker Jacker stuff from the last book)

And then it’s time to start the filming, beginning with the victors “greet[ing] each other at the beginning of their marvelous trip” (according to Effie Trinket).

Katniss pulls out all the stops as she recalls President Snow’s words and runs to Peeta, who spins her around and then they fall in the snow and “that’s where we have our first kiss in months.”

Katniss realizes that although they’re awkward in person, Peeta is not going to expose her deception on camera. “He’s still looking out for me. Just as he did in the arena. Somehow the thought makes me want to cry.”

(Awkward and sad, the tone of this scene. It also makes you think more about the price paid by actors in real world movies, how many have to fake “being in love” with multiple other actors for the entertainment of the audience and how that can’t be healthy, emotionally. 

(I’m not surprised that many actors’ personal lives are a mess. The better they’re able to fake it for the cameras, the less of a healthy sense of self they have when they aren’t in front of a camera. If you know you yourself can act well enough to “delude” people into thinking it’s the real thing, how can you trust other humans to not be acting around you? It’s kind of sad, actually.)

Finally, they’re all on the train, and that’s when Katniss has a chance to knock on Haymitch’s door. He’s grumpy at being disturbed, but just then the train stops for fuel and Haymitch pushes his way out of the train for some “fresh air.”

Once outside, away from the possibly-bugged train, Katniss tells Haymitch about Snow’s visit, Gale’s kiss, everything.

Katniss asks Haymitch to help her make it through this trip, but Haymitch cuts her off. It’s not just this trip, he says. From now on, she and Peeta have joined the ranks of the Hunger Games mentors. And every year, they’ll be revisiting their romance and “broadcast[ing] the details of your private life, and you’ll never, ever be able to do anything but live happily ever after with that boy.”

Katniss is struck by the truth of what Haymitch has said, realizing that she doesn’t even have the option of staying alone and single, as she’d previously intended to do, before volunteering for the Games in Book 1:

In order to survive and save her family, Katniss will have to marry Peeta.

Comments & Analysis

Opening: The smell of blood…it was on his breath.

Closing: I nod. He means there’s only one future, if I want to keep those I love alive and stay alive myself. I’ll have to marry Peeta.

PROMISES & PAYOFFS

Promises:

• Snow’s going to make good on his threat to hurt Katniss’ loved ones (or try to, at any rate) if she doesn’t pull of “girl-crazed-with-love” and calm down the metaphorical fires of rebellion she’s inspired in the Districts.
• But also, Katniss is NOT going to be able to calm down the agitation in the Districts, because otherwise we’d have no more story.

Payoffs:

• We get to see Cinna and the prep team again, and see how their friendship grows.

Complications:

• Katniss is facing a dire threat that affects a whole lot of people, and has virtually no one to confide in, except Haymitch, and he’s a bit unreliable…

OTHER COMMENTS

• I found it interesting that when told she will have to “live happily ever after” with Peeta, Katniss’ mind instantly goes to marriage. That IS the correct implication, of course, but it reminds me of how marriage has become so devalued in our current society.
• There are many people who proudly talk about how they just want to live together with their squeeze, without the commitment of a formal marriage.
• But considering how Panem is technically a society that is barely surviving after catastrophic natural disasters and civil war, it also makes sense that marriage is important to their culture. When people are expected to marry and raise children in a nuclear family, that provides stability in the chaos, structure and support in a welfare-less state.
• It’s really only societies that are a bit too rich and comfortable that have the luxury of dabbling in costly (financially, emotionally, and in every other way) “alternative arrangements” on such a large scale like ours here in America/the West in general.
• There was a time, historically, when non-marriage arrangements (living together, single motherhood, hooking up) were nearly unheard of, and heavily frowned upon. That’s because a large-scale non-marriage-based culture would make society fall apart too easily.

Chapter 4

In This Chapter

• Katniss begins the Victor’s Tour
• Katniss and Peeta make up (sort of)
• Readers learn Katniss’ and Peeta’s favorite colors
• Things go sideways at District 11

Haymitch tries to comfort Katniss (sort of) with a “You could do a lot worse, you know,” and Katniss heads back to her room, thinking about everything Haymitch has said, knowing he’s right about all of it.

She wonders if she’ll be forced to have children, knowing that if she does, their chances of being selected for the Games will be higher than normal, because of course it would be “something to see the child of not one but two victors chosen fo rthe arena…Given all the trouble I’ve caused, I’ve probably guaranteed any child of mine a spot in the Games.”

(Again, here’s Katniss’ natural gift for understanding how the showbiz game works)

This makes Katniss realize why Haymitch is the way he is, choosing to live alone, spending most of his time drunk.

Katniss realizes she can’t let Snow “condemn” her to this life. She starts thinking about whether or not she can run away, but then pauses that thought to focus on “giving a good show” for the Victory Tour, because “too many people’s fates depend” on this.

When Katniss wakes up the next day, she’s told that they’re about to reach District 11, and as Katniss eats breakfast, she notes that the kitchen staff has specifically made her favorite lamb stew with dried plums, to please her.

(Lamb stew — Nice nod to the last book)

Next, Katniss gets prepped by her makeup team (again), and at lunch, she can’t bring herself to eat. Finally, the pressure gets to Katniss, and she snaps at Effie, who has been complaining about a delay in the schedule, then Katniss stalks off the train which has paused to replace a malfunctioning part.

She hears someone behind her and assumes it’s Haymitch, but it’s Peeta. He’s come out to apologize for his part in the stiffness between them since the awkward ending to the Games last year.

“I don’t want us to go on like this, ignoring each other in real life and falling into the snow every time there’s a camera around. So I thought if I stopped being so, you know, wounded, we could take a shot at just being friends,” he says.

(And this is why Peeta is the “perfect guy” character. Even though a lot of the awkwardness is Katniss’ own fault, Peeta takes full responsibility without assigning any to her, humbles himself and offers the olive branch first. Humility — not the cringing kind, but the noble kind, which Peeta has in spades — is extremely attractive, not to mention rare)

Katniss accepts the olive branch and Peeta asks her what’s wrong. When Katniss has a hard time answering, he says: “Let’s start with something more basic. Isn’t it strange that I know you’d risk your life to save mine…but I don’t know what your favorite color is?”

(It’s interesting that Peeta leads with this “you’d risk your life to save mine.” It reminds Katniss and the reader of Katniss’ noble side, so we know that Peeta isn’t the only “good guy,” at least not completely, and that there’s a good reason why he even chose Katniss in the first place — he saw the nobility in her from the start, and that makes her a fitting person for him to fall for. Because if he loved someone who didn’t deserve it at least a little, that would reflect badly on his judgment and character)

They exchange info on their favorite colors (Katniss: green, Peeta: orange), and then Peeta offers to show Katniss his paintings.

First, Katniss apologizes to Effie, and then she follows Peeta to his room to see the paintings.

(Katniss remembering on her own to apologize to Effie is a slight echo of what Peeta did, earlier. She is capable of humbling herself, too, which is what makes her more worthy of an almost-purely-good character like Peeta)

Peeta’s paintings are all of moments in the arena, and many of the paintings feature Katniss. (Of course they do, of course. There’s a good reason why the Careers in Book 1 called him “Lover Boy.” It’s part facetious, part serious.)

Katniss both admires and hates the paintings. Admires the accuracy, hates the memories they bring up.

She asks if Peeta’s painting really helps him get over the events of the arena, and notes that Haymitch hasn’t gotten over his memories, which is probably why he doesnt’ like to sleep in the dark and always keeps a knife at hand.

“for me, it’s better to wake up with a paintbrush than a knife in my hand,” Peeta replies simply.

(And again this is why even from the start Gale never has a chance. Peeta represents life, forgiveness, rebirth, goodness, Gale is like a gale-force wind that whips a small flame into a ranging forest fire of destruction. You can see this symbolically in the difference between Haymitch’s knife — used to kill, in the arena — and Peeta’s paintbrush — used to create beauty, the stuff that makes life worth living)

They arrive in District 11, and Katniss is surprised by the great size of the place, as well as how strictly it’s fenced in.

Katniss and Peeta are ushered onto a stage for the official ceremony, and from that vantage point, Katniss can see Rue’s and Thresh’s families. Peeta speaks first, easily giving as usual a heartfelt speech about Thresh and Rue and how they both “kept me [Katniss] alive — thereby keeping him alive,” which is a “debt we can never reapy.”

Then Peeta pauses and adds something new: he would like to give the families one month of their winnings every year for the rest of their lives.

Katniss is surprised by his thoughtfulness and thanks him with a kiss, which “doesn’t seem forced at all.”

And then Katniss sees one of Rue’s little sisters staring reproachfully at her, and realizes she must say something about Rue. She stumbles forward and thanks District Eleven, Thresh, and Rue — “thank you for your children…and thank you all for the bread.”

And then someone whistles Rue’s “four-note mockingjay tune.” It’s an old man in overalls, and at this signal, the whole crowd lifts up the three-finger District 12 salute that Katniss gave Rue in the arena.

The salute strikes terror into Katniss’ heart as she remembers President Snow’s words, and sure enough, as she and Peeta are herded back off the stage, they see a pair of Peacekeepers shoot the old man who whistled.

Comments & Analysis

Opening: We slog back to the train in silence.

Closing: A pair of Peacekeepers dragging the old man who whistled to the top of the steps. Forcing him to his knees before the crowd. And putting a bullet through his head.

PROMISES & PAYOFFS

Promises:

• Although Katniss realizes she will be forced to marry Peeta, it’s probably not going to be that easy…whatever expectations the Capitol have will be flipped on their head

Payoffs:

• Peeta acknowledges that he shouldn’t have expected Katniss to fall for him that easily, and they become friends again, sort of
• A minor one: We get to “see” the paintings Peeta made, which Katniss referenced in an earlier chapter.

Complications:

• Katniss realizes that, if she plays the rest of her life according to the Capitol requirements, she will HAVE to stay with Peeta forever. She doesn’t have even that freedom of choosing to be single or choosing her husband herself.

OTHER COMMENTS

• One thing I’ve noticed about this book is there’s a lot less separation. The pace in some sense is slower, because there’s not a lot of outward action, but there’s a lot of internal drama, and the separations between chapters are not as crisp and cliff-hanger-y as in the first book.
• Another thing is, Panem is an interesting concept as a world: There are aspects of vestigial American/Western civilization hanging on (like the concept of women having careers and choosing their own spouses, which is really not something women did in ancient times), but also a return to ancient pagan practices, Nazi-style (like the gladiator-esque Games being the main thing), plus futuristic sci-fi technology (muttations, the ability to heal scars so that htey look perfect, etc), and the excesses of modern fashion (the Capitol people are described the way celebrities dress at the Met Gala, and then some).

Chapter 5

In This Chapter

• Peeta loses his temper (for once)
• Katniss’ screaming nightmares causes Peeta to come comfort her
• Peeta and Katniss take their “romance” to the next level on TV

As they return to their team, Effie asks what happened, saying that the television feed cut off after Katniss’ speech and Haymitch heard gunshots. Peeta lies and says nothing happened, but through the door, they hear more gunshots.

Then Haymitch orders Peeta and Katniss to follow him. They travel through District 11’s Justice Building while Haymitch yanks off their mics and stuffs them beneath a couch cushion, and then they arrive at a ladder to a trap door to the dome of the building.

Haymitch demands to know what happened, and when Peeta explains and then asks what’s going on, Haymitch tells Katniss: “It will be better coming from you.”

I don’t agree, Katniss thinks to herself. I think it will be a hundred times worse coming from me.

But she does as Haymitch asks and tells Peeta everything, from President Snow’s visit to Gale’s kiss, to the threat of uprisings, all because of the “trick with the berries” at the end of their Games.

“I was supposed to fix things on this tour. Make everyone…believe I acted out of love. Calm things down,” Katniss says, “But obviously, all I’ve done today is get three people killed…”

Peeta blames himself too, and in a rare fit of anger, hits a lamp which shatters.

“This has to stop. right now. This — this — game you two play, where you tell eeach other secrets but keep them from me like I’m too inconsequential or stupid or weak to handle them.”

“It’s not like that, Peeta — “ I begin.

“It’s exactly like that!” he yells at me. “I have people I care about, too, Katniss! Family and friends back in District Twelve who will be just as dead as yours if we don’t pull this thing off.”

(Aha! Another mention of “games.” It’s the theme. Also, it’s interesting to see Peeta get mad. He’s not the kind to anger easily, and even when in a negative emotional state, he has a lot of self control. So seeing him lash out means things are REALLY serious. 

(Also, Peeta’s comment about his family and friends being “just as dead” as Katniss’ is not entirely true. Aside from being the main character, in the story-world, Katniss is the instigator of the trouble, so her people are under more threat than Peeta’s who are just under the general threat of what would happen to everyone if the uprisings got out of hand.

(On another note — we readers never see or get to know Peeta’s friends and family. They are basically NPCs to us, because he’s not really the main character. And there’s some foreshadowed dramatic irony here, for those who’ve read the entire series, considering that Katniss’ loved ones, who are more threatened, actually make it — mostly — while Peeta’s loved ones are blasted to death in the end. This is perhaps another part of the reason why we readers aren’t given a chance to know them all that well, aside from his parents.)

Peeta smashes another statue in the room as he expresses his frustration that his kindly-meant gesture has probably had the opposite effect — condemning Rue’s and Thresh’s families, rather than helping them.

Katniss thinks to herself that she’s never seen him like this.

(Another brick in the edifice of what a good guy Peeta really is. Not just a “nice guy” but a truly GOOD guy, because he doesn’t get mad when he himself is injured , physically or emotionally— not even when Katniss tells him she’s been faking all the lovey-dovey stuff. But he gets mad when other people’s lives are in danger. Meaning he is about as selfless as selfless gets) 

“Even in the arena, you two had some sort of system worked out, didn’t you?” Peeta asks them. “Something I wasn’t part of.”

And Katniss tells him no, it was just that she could read Haymitch’s mind by what he sent or didn’t send.

Peeta observes that he didn’t have that opportunity because Haymitch never sent him anything, and Katniss realizes she hasn’t thought much about the situation from Peeta’s perspective, “How it must have looked…when I appeared in the arena having received burn medicine and bread when he, who was at death’s door, had gotten nothing.”

Before Haymitch can defend his decision-making, Peeta says: “Don’t bother, Haymitch. I know you had to choose one of us. And I’d have wanted it to be her. But this is something different. People are dead out there…I have to know what I’m walking into.”

Haymitch agrees, and Peeta stalks out without even looking at Katniss.

“Did you choose me, Haymitch,” Katniss asks. Haymitch replies in the affirmative.

“Why? You like him better,” Katniss says.

True, Haymitch replies, but at the time he could only hope to get one out alive and “I thought, since he was determined to protect you, well, between the three of us, we might be able to bring you home.”

Katniss doesn’t know how to respond to this, and Haymitch tells her: “You’ll see, the choices you’ll have to make. If we survive this…You’ll learn.”

And Katniss reflects that the wider world is worse than District 12. More brutal. And she realizes Snow’s warning about potential uprisings is right on the money.

Katniss needs to get dressed for dinner, and as they assemble, Effie is out of sorts because the Peacemakers have been treating her rather roughly. Katniss knows why, of course, but doesn’t tell Effie about all the political machinations going on behind the scenes.

As she and Peeta wait to make their entrance for the celebratory dinner, Peeta in effect apologizes for his temper earlier, and Katniss acknowledges that she also broke a few things the first time he dropped a secret bomb on her (confessing his feelings on live TV in book one).

Peeta asks: “Was that really the only time you kissed Gale?” which surprises Katniss: “With all that has happened today, has that question actually been preying on him?” she thinks to herself.

(It’s kind of interesting, the roles Katniss and Peeta play. The average man and woman would be flip-flopped, as in general men are more focused on things & strategies, and women more on people & relationships. 

(In the Hunger Games, however, that’s switched: Peeta is more concerned about people and relationships and Katniss is more focused on keeping everyone alive, by hook or by crook.

(This is another reason why HG did so well, it took some familiar tropes and roles, and then just slightly twisted them to make them interesting). 

At the dinner, Katniss and Peeta “are borderline delirious in our love for each other. We kiss, we dance, we get caught trying to sneak away to be alone. On the train, we are quietly miserable as we try to assess what effect we might be having.”

(What she calls love is not exactly what I’d call it, although to be fair, there’s not a really good word for this romance business…just “romance” I guess. Real love isn’t “deliriously sneaking around” 

(Also, great contrast between the last two sentences. It’s very sudden and jarring, the transition — or lack of one — between the “acting deliriously in love” and the “silent miserable assessment” of their performance afterwards.)

The text rushes readers through the visits in the other districts, briefly summarizing Katniss’ experience seeing “genuine elation…and under the elation, fury,” in the faces of the people and realizing “no show of love, however believable, will turn this tide.”

Katniss starts having screaming nightmares, and Peeta “who spends much of the night roaming the train” comes in to comfort her, and ends up cuddling with her every night — “we manage the darkness as we did in the arena, wrapped in each other’s arms, guarding against dangers that can descend at any moment.”

(Trauma bonding. Although in this case, Katniss is very lucky that she’s trauma-bonded to someone who isn’t a complete wacko. But again — Gale has no chance, here. Zero. None.)

This “arrangement” of theirs “quickly becomes a subject of gossip on the train,” which Katniss welcomes, hoping the chatter on the grapevine will “get back to President Snow.”

She tells Effie she and Peeta will try to be “more discreet” but of course they don’t.

By the time they reach the Capitol, they’re realizing it’s “too little, too late.” And Katniss is the one who proposes a “public marriage proposal,” which Peeta agrees to, but then he “disappears to his room for a long time.”

When Haymitch tells Katniss to leave him alone, Katniss says: “I thought he wanted it, anyway.”

“Not like this,” Haymitch tells her. “He wanted it to be real.”

(Oh, Katniss. Just when readers start to really feel for her, she lets slip a little of her self-centeredness. It is realistic, of course, especially for a teenage girl, but it does seem a bit pretentious for her to just assume “I thought he wanted it, anyway,” without considering how that sounds, how Peeta must be feeling about all this, etc.)

So during the Caesar Flickerman interview at the Capitol, Peeta proposes in front of the cameras, Katniss accepts, Caesar is “beside himself,” the Capitol audience is “hysterical,” and President Snow shows up to congratulate them.

But as he kisses Katniss’s cheek, Snow’s eyes tell her that all of her efforts to calm the storm were for naught.

Comments & Analysis

Opening: The man has only just crumpled to the ground when a wall of white Peacekeeper uniforms blocks our view.

Closing: Did I do it? Was it enough? Was giving everything over to you, keeping up the game, promising to marry Peeta enough? // In answer, he gives an almost imperceptible shake of his head.

PROMISES & PAYOFFS

Promises:

• Peeta will publicly propose marriage to Katniss (to try to stave off the unrest in the Districts)

Payoffs:

• We start to see the effect that the uprisings are having on Katniss.
• Peeta is finally brought into the know about Snow’s threats.

Complications:

• Katniss realizes she will never leave the Games. Even if the status quo kept going on, she’d just be a mentor to next year’s tributes…she’s stuck between the proverbial rock (her desire to survive and help the people she loves survive) and hard place (perpetuating and participating in the unethical Hunger Games)

OTHER COMMENTS

• Peeta is the character with the most self-control of all of our main characters. He’s not impulsive like Katniss, alcoholic like Haymitch, or easily angered like Gale. So seeing him lose his temper is really interesting, especially when you see the reason why — a mix of feeling like he’s being left out of Haymitch and Katniss’ inner circle, plus frustration with himself for inadvertently making other people’s lives worse, because he was missing some key information.
• Basically everything that we learn about Peeta makes us like him more, which is a good contrast considering everything we learn about Panem and the whole situation makes us like it less.

Chapter 6

In This Chapter

• Katniss and Peeta are newly horrified by the Capitol’s excesses, making Peeta say something uncharacteristic
• Katniss sees something she’s not supposed to see back home on the mayor’s TV

Now that all hope is dead, Katniss is actually quite calm.

“So instead of crumpling to the ground and weeping, I find myself standing up straighter and with more confidence than I have in weeks…And when President Snow silences the audience and says, ‘What do you think about us throwing them a wedding right here in the Capitol?’ I pull off girl-almost-catatonic-with-joy without a hitch.”

(Mini note: The hyphenated description of the role Katniss is “playing” is a clever, subtly funny piece of writing. Very nice. Keep this in the writer’s treasure chest as a model.)

“You’ll probably have to pass a new law,” I say with a giggle.

“If that’s what it takes,” says the president with conspirational good humor.

Oh, the fun we two have together.

(This last line here reminds me of what Orson Scott Card said about “takes” and “attitude” in his book on Characterization & Voice. It’s another reason why Katniss is such a great character to follow — the sense of sardonic humor that shines through her narration is the “acid” that cuts through the cloying, smothering “fattiness” of bad news and tragic situations that constitutes the majority of this story)

At the dinner, Peeta is puzzled by Katniss’ sudden “letting loose,” not knowing that Snow has basically told Katniss that they have failed his test.

They enjoy all the food and Katniss notices that her mockingjay pin has become a “new fashion sensation,” imagining “how nuts that makes President Snow.”

When Peeta and Katniss have both stuffed themselves to the point where they can’t take another bite, they are told by Octavia from Katniss’ prep team that they can take a liquid that will make them vomit so they can eat more.

(This was an actual practice during Romanic times. Gross, in more ways than one. As someone who loathes nausea and vomiting, I cannot imagine why anyone would voluntarily force themselves to vomit. Things like this Roman practice and bulimia, I cannot understand. Brings on shudders.)

This is too much for Peeta, who says as he dances with Katniss: “You go along, thinking you can deal with it, thinking maybe they’re not so bad, and then you — ” he can’t finish.

“Peeta, they bring us here to fight to the death for their entertainment. Really, this is nothing by comparison,” Katniss points out.

“I know…it’s just sometimes I can’t stand it anymore,” Peeta says, and then drops the bomb — “Maybe we were wrong, Katniss…about trying to subdue things in the districts.”

(Sounding like Gale, here.)

“Save it for home,” Katniss tells him, and then they are interrupted by Plutarch Heavensbee, the new Gamemaker. Heavensbee whisks Katniss away for a dance, with Peeta’s permission, and while Katniss isn’t thrilled to be in close proximity with a Gamemaker, Heavensbee surprises her by pulling out a gold watch.

When he runs his thumb over the surface, it reveals a glowing mockingjay. “It’s one of a kind,” he tells Katniss, and then tells her it’s a secret.

Eventually, the party ends, and Katniss and the entourage are heading back to their train.

She wakes up the next morning next to Peeta, who tells her that she didn’t have any nightmares the night before. Instead, Katniss recalls that she dreamed of a mockingjay with Rue’s voice.

“Where did she take you?” he says, brushing my hair off my forehead.

(These kinds of casual motions are really good at establishing a visual/embodied feeling of care and tenderness. Collins is pretty good about scattering these throughout to draw readers in and make them care about the characters and their relationships. From Katniss tucking in her little sister’s shirt in the first book to Peeta smoothing Katniss’ hair in the caves and now here again)

And then Katniss asks Peeta why she never knows when he’s having a nightmare.

“I don’t know. I don’t think I cry out or thrash around or anything. I just come to, paralyzed with terror,” he tells her. And when Katniss tells him he should wake her, thinking how unfair it is that her nightmares disturb his sleep 2–3 times per night, Peeta says:

“‘It’s not necessary. My nightmares are usually about losing you…I’m okay once I realize you’re here.’”

“Ugh. Peeta makes comments like this in such an offhand way, and it’s like being hit in the gut. He’s only answering my question honestly…But I still feel awful, as if I’ve been using him in some terrible way. Have I? I don’t know. I only know that for the first time, I feel immoral about him being here in my bed. Which is ironic since we’re officially engaged now.”

(Aside from being uber “sweet,” and building up the relationship between these two characters, this comment also makes you worry about Peeta in another way — just how deprived and unloving was his childhood that he is attached enough to Katniss [just Katniss, not his parents, brothers, or anyone else] to make losing her the focus of his nightmares? 

(Also, “offhand” is exactly why this moment works so powerfully — things said and done artlessly are more valuable than carefully chosen words and actions. 

(This thing about immorality is also interesting. It’s pretty clear Katniss and Peeta are not really doing anything…let’s say, “traditionally immoral,” but that’s not what Katniss is talking about. She’s talking about using Peeta as her emotional support when she’s not really giving in kind what she’s taking. 

(But that’s actually pretty good commentary on the real-life practice of “hooking up.” There’s a reason why that was frowned upon heavily in the not-so-distant past. A truth that too many years of propaganda and marketing has tried to wipe from our collective understanding — 

(People can’t normally sleep with people [even in the innocent way that Katniss and Peeta cuddle in this PG-13 book] without their emotions and their deeper selves getting involved. And there IS something immoral about getting involved with someone in that way, without being committed — kind of like playing a “trust fall” game and then walking away when the other person is falling backwards, letting them smash their head on the ground.

(This is why the Hunger Games series works [or has been working, so far]. Its social / philosophical commentary isn’t heavy handed, and at times I’m not sure the author herself even realizes all of the themes she’s commenting on or how she’s doing it, but the characters’ reactions to the complex situations they face are true-to-life, and that makes the story resonate much more powerfully in the readers’ minds.)

The last stop on the tour is the celebratory feast in District 12, and as Katniss thinks of this, her narration fills the readers in on another development that’s taken place since the end of the last book — Katniss has befriended the mayor’s daughter, Madge, and they eat at each other’s houses.

So when they reach the mayor’s house, where the final feast is to take place, Katniss gives Madge a quick hug before Effie hustles her (Katniss, of course) off to get dressed.

After getting into her gown, Katniss wanders over to the mayor’s study to say hi, but he’s not there. The TV is on, though, and she sees clips from the Capitol party the night before. She and Peeta are shown, “dancing, eating, kissing”:

“This will be playing in every household in Panem right now. The audience must be sick to death of the star-crossed lovers from District 12. I know I am.”

Just then, an update flashes on screen — showing a mob in District 8, waving flags of Katniss’ face from the rooftops.

Buildings are burning, peacekeepers are killing people at random, and Katniss realizes she is witnessing an uprising.

Comments & Analysis

Opening: In that one slight motion, I see the end of hope, the beginning of the destruction of everything I hold dear in the world.

Closing: I’ve never seen anything like it, but I can only be witnessing one thing. This is what President Snow calls an uprising.

PROMISES & PAYOFFS

Promises:

• We will see the unrest in the Districts get worse.
• Plutarch Heavensbee showing Katniss his mockingjay watch is going to come back later.

Payoffs:

• Katniss and Peeta’s discussion about nightmares brings them closer.

Complications:

• Even Peeta is starting to think that overthrowing the government might actually be a good idea.

OTHER COMMENTS

• It’s worth noting that Snow is called the “president.” He’s not, of course, a president. He’s a dictator. But this is very true-to-life ~
• Because tyrants never call themselves tyrants, and rarely even call themselves “Emperor” or “King” like Napoleon did. Especially in a post-constitutional-republican country like Panem (which is based on a future-dystopian-America).
• For dictators, keeping up the appearance of good, right, legitimate is important even when the actual government is evil, cruel, and tyrannical. Very Machiavellian.

Chapter 7

In This Chapter

• Katniss attempts to save her relationship with Gale
• Katniss’ hesitation causes Gale to change his mind rapidly

Katniss heads to the lake, the one she never told Gale about. Except now she’s told him, because she needs to talk to him somewhere they can’t be spied on, and she no longer is confident about their old rendezvous point.

As she makes her way to the new meeting spot, she reflects back on what happened in the mayor’s house.

After seeing the update on the TV, Katniss turns to leave and bumps into the mayor in the hall. After a brief exchange, Katniss finds Madge in her room and talks about how her gift of the mockingjay pin is “all the rage” in the Capitol.

When Katniss asks where Madge got the pin in the first place, Madge says it was her aunt’s. Katniss notes how a mockingjay is a bit of a “funny choice” because of how they are a reminder of the Capitol’s jabberjays backfiring on them.

“They’re just songbirds” Madge says, but Katniss is not so sure. “A mockingbird is just a songbird. A mockingjay is a creature the Capitol never intended to exist,” Katniss thinks to herself.

(Another great thematic point — that which brings down tyrannical systems is often not something obvious and destructive, like, say, a lion. Often it’s something small, seemingly-innocuous, and “underdog-ish” that changes everything.)

(This reminds me of somethin from First Corinthians: “God has chosen what is foolish in the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen what is weak in the world to shame the strong. God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things — and the things that are not — to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him.”

(Granted, this is almost definitely not what the author was trying to say, exactly, but all I’m pointing out is that great change can often come from tiny unexpected beginnings. You see that happening in history, in popular and long-lasting stories, probably in your own life, even)

Katniss arrives at an old hut next to the lake, a leftover building from a time before, and then Gale shows up with a dead wild turkey.

Katniss seees him standing there in the doorway, “his temper [not] quite mask[ing] the hurt, the sense of betrayal at my engagement to Peeta” and realizes this is her one chance to “not lose Gale forever.”

So she goes “straight to the heart” of her defense: “President Snow personally threatened to have you killed.”

Plus both of their families, Katniss adds. And that’s enough for Gale to come inside the house.

She tells him the whole story about President Snow and “the Capitol’s fury.”

“Well, you really made a mess of things,” Gale comments when Katniss pauses for a drink.

“I’m not even done,” she says, but he tells her to skip ahead to her plan.

“We run away,” Katniss says.

(Nice circle back to the opening of the first book, when Gale was the one who suggested running away, and Katniss, when she volunteers for Prim, realizes she was right to have stayed because that was the only way she could have saved Prim. 

(Spoiler alert: In like manner, this “run away” idea is going to be foiled again, and again Katniss is going to be glad she stayed, this time to save someone else. You can guess who. It won’t take much guessing.)

Gale is surprised at first, but only for a few seconds. Then he picks up Katniss and is spinning her around, laughing, agreeing.

He pulls her closer, so that they are forehead to forehead.

“I close my eyes, soaking in his warmth…I don’t try to move away. Why should I, anyway? His voice drops to a whisper: ‘I love you.’

“That’s why.”

(Besides being hilarious, that last line, this is another interesting way to ramp up the romantic triangle tension. Peeta is already too good, too suitable for Katniss in pretty much every way that matters most, so Gale has to do something now to pull Katniss — and the audience — in his direction a bit to keep the conflict going. 

(And since readers are pretty desensitized at this point to physical shows of affection — as Katniss constantly reminds us, all the kissing she does with Peeta is mostly just for show — Gale’s ace in the hole is to verbalize his love first. Even Peeta has not said those exact “three little words,” although everything he’s done up to this point has demonstrated it. 

(Credit where credit is due: Collins knows how to jerk the reader’s chain without yanking them so off balance that they get annoyed or confused about who to really root for.)

Katniss isn’t sure how to respond, to true to form she “come[s] up with what must be the worst possible response. ‘I know.’”

Gale starts to pull away, but Katniss grabs him, saying:

“You know what you are to me…Gale, I can’t think about anyone that way now. All I can think about, every day, every waking minute since they drew Prim’s name at the reaping, is how afraid I am.”

(Another contrast between G & P: Both guys pull away from Katniss when she doesn’t return their love in the way they wish. However, Peeta apologizes for his reaction, realizing it is unfair to expect Katniss to return his feelings considering the dire situation they’re in, whereas Gale seems more focused on his own hurt than on Katniss’ reasons for being unable to return his affections. 

(Although, to be fair to Gale, Peeta has had a few months to mull it over, and Gale is still in the immediate aftermath of the moment. So we readers should reserve judgment and see whether he pulls a Peeta and shows understanding of Katniss’ perspective later on… 

(Spoiler alert: He never does. Like I said. It’s kind of obvious which of these two the author wants readers to root for.)

Gale “swallows his disappointment,” and then they start to talk about the logistics of persuading their respective families to follow them into the woods. But when Katniss brings up Haymitch and then Peeta, their discussion turns sour again.

Gale is particularly irritated that Katniss is planning to bring Peeta, which, Katniss points out, she has to do, or else they’ll torture him to death trying to find her.

What about Peeta’s family? Gale points out. They’d never come along too. What if Peeta decides to stay?

“Then he stays,” Katniss says, trying to “sound indifferent,” but her voice cracking gives her away.

“You’d leave him behind?” Gale asks.

“To save Prim and my mother, yes,” I answer. “I mean, no! I’ll get him to come.”

“And me, would you leave me?” Gale’s expression is rock hard now. “Just if, for instance, I can’t convince my mother to drag three young kids into the wilderness in winter.”

(I don’t know why I find Katniss’ reaction a little bit amusing, but it is, in a shake-your-head kind of way. But hey, she’s been real with us, the readers, through her narration all this time. In the first book, Katniss clearly states that Prim is the only one she is “sure she loves.” The ONLY one. 

(Sure, Katniss is starting to like / admire / care about Peeta, recognizing the rare quality of goodness and integrity that he has, but she doesn’t have enough history with him to really love him just yet. 

(This is a little bit like the situation in the Wrinkle in Time book, where Meg has to return to the evil planet of Camazotz to save her baby brother Charles Wallace. Their recently-rescued father doesn’t want her to do it, and he would go himself, but because he doesn’t have the connection with Charles Wallace that Meg does, Meg is the only one who has a chance of bringing Charles Wallace back. 

(Katniss and Peeta are a bit like Charles Wallace and his father, in this case. There is a connection, but that connection lacks the trust developed over years of personal history. That history is something Katniss does have with Gale, but Gale is wasting that connection and failing pretty hard, here. 

(He wants Katniss to prioritize him, but she can’t do that right now. For her, it’s family first. Specifically, little sister first. It’s why she instinctively answers Gale’s first question with “yes,” she’d leave Peeta behind to save Prim. And then she realizes how that sounds, and changes her answer to “no,” but it’s enough to tell Gale that if she’d leave Peeta for Prim, she’d probably leave him for Prim, too, and that irks him. Even though, really it shouldn’t. 

(As her oldest, closest friend, Gale should know what kind of person Katniss is, and that his question to her isn’t fair. Even Peeta understands this, and doesn’t pressure her about it, goes out of his way to apologize for being hurt by her lack of response. That’s why even though Peeta is a new addition to Katniss’ life, he’s handily beating the “old friend” that is Gale.)

Katniss is provoked enough to blurt out that there’s an uprising in District Eight, and “the effect on Gale is immediate — the flush on his cheeks, the brightness in his gray eyes.”

He’s excited about the uprising in Eight and Katniss tries to backpedal, but it’s too late. Gale refuses to leave now, now that there’s a chance the districts might rebel against the Capitol and end the starvation and slavery and Hunger Gaming. He wants to join the fight.

Gale leaves, and Katniss tries to calm down. She reflects on Snow’s comments about how “any girl who goes to such lengths to preserve her life isn’t going to be interested in throwing it away with both hands.”

She decides her next move is to ask Peeta next. Katniss thinks, “In a strange way, since he’s seen some of what I’ve seen on the tour, he may be an easier sell than Gale was.”

And sure enough, when Katniss asks: Peeta, if I asked you to run away from the district with me, would you?

He answers: Depends on why you’re asking.

Katniss reveals that there’s been an uprising in Eight, and Peeta immediately understands that it wouldn’t just be the two of them. So he asks who else is going. Katniss mentions her family, his family, and “Haymitch, maybe,” and Peeta asks: “What about Gale.”

(Huge contrast here. Gale doesn’t even think of Peeta when Katniss asks him, but Peeta’s first specific ask is about Gale. It shows that Peeta understands Katniss and the people she cares about, and he doesn’t have the same kind of attitude that Gale does. Sure, he does seem sad at times when Gale’s pre-eminence in Katniss’ life comes up, but his sadness isn’t quite the same as Gale’s jealous anger)

“He might have other plans,” Katniss says evasively, and Peeta gives her a rueful smile. “I bet he does. Sure, Katniss, I’ll go.”

Katniss feels hopeful for a moment, but then Peeta says: “Yeah. But I don’t think for a minute you will.”

(Another great example of Peeta knowing Katniss better than she knows herself — she would never go unless she could take everyone she cared about with her, and at this point, Gale is definitely not going, which means she wouldn’t really go in the end, either).

This angers Katniss, and she takes off, but Peeta chases after her to say he really will go, but they should check with Haymitch to “make sure we won’t be making things worse for everyone.”

They are interrupted by a strange sound — whistling, an impact, “the intake of breath from a crowd,” and from Peeta’s face, he instantly knows what’s going on, but when they reach the square, they can’t see through the thick crowd.

Peeta takes a look and then tries to force Katniss to go home, but of course, she doesn’t. Katniss breaks away, pushes through the crowd and sees that Gale is being publicly whipped for the wild turkey he shot earlier. He’s unconscious, and “what used to be his back is a raw, bloody slab of meat.”

And there’s a new Head Peacekeeper standing in Cray’s uniform, standing behind him and raising his whip arm.

Comments & Analysis

Opening: A leather bag filled with food and a flask of hot tea. A pair of fur-lined gloves that Cinna left behind. Three twigs, broken from the naked trees, lying in the snow, pointing in the direction I will travel.

Closing: The pieces of the picture do not quite come together until I see his arm raise the whip.

PROMISES & PAYOFFS

Promises:

• The mockingjay symbol will grow in importance as the story continues.
• Gale being hurt will have an effect on the love triangle.

Payoffs:

• We come full circle from Gale proposing running away in Book 1 to Katniss doing it in Book 2.

Complications:

• Gale doesn’t want to run away anymore, he wants to stay and fight.

OTHER COMMENTS

• The thing about fighting back against injustice or something monstrous is that you have to be really careful about not becoming the thing you hate itself. It’s common as mud for so-called “freedom fighters” to become the tyrants that they say they are fighting against, and worse (this is actually a major theme in the third book — spoiler! …yeah, this is a deep-dive analysis, so no such thing as spoilers anyway…)
• This is the reason why the American Revolution was an anomaly. Historically, most revolutions leave the people the same or worse off than they were before. (Think French Revolution, Russian Revolution, Chinese Cultural Revolution, and multiple Latin American revolutions).
• The American Revolution was a bit different, though, for multiple complex reasons, but one of them being that the people weren’t just fighting for freedom FROM tyranny, but freedom TO worship their God. It was why so many like-minded pioneers immigrated to the country in the first place, after all.
• Anyways, this tendency of revolutionaries to become consumed by their own hatred is the reason why Gale is a problem. He’s hotheaded rather than principled, and he doesn’t really know what he’s fighting for, aside from the immediate relief of members of his family and community.
• Gale’s anger and thirst for revenge is a huge liability for himself and his cause and his people, and it will end up inadvertently making him completely lose Katniss — not just as a romantic partner or friend, but even as a friendly acquaintance.
• In contrast, from the start, Peeta is primarily motivated by love (represented by his love for Katniss), and higher principles (his telling Katniss the night before the Games that he wants to “die as himself” and not let the Capitol “change him”). Peeta doesn’t think the Capitol can be overthrown or the Games subverted, so his goal is to maintain his humanity in spite of the difficult situation he finds himself in.
• But when Peeta starts to see that perhaps a revolution leading to the overthrow of evil IS possible, he is not a coward — he is also open to entertaining the idea, carefully and wisely.
• Even without that possibility however, Peeta’s attitude is the right one. Sometimes to fight against an evil, there will be people who have to make the ultimate sacrifice in the faith that even though they themselves will not see the fruit of their actions, others will benefit from it one day.
• This is what the concept of true martyrdom is. This is the attitude of people like Hans and Sophie Scholl — a brother and sister who tried to wake up their fellow college students to the evils of the Nazi ideology and were both executed for it. Or people like Father Maximilian Kolbe, who sacrificed his own life for a stranger’s in the concentration camps. And many thousands more like them. They were willing to stake everything on doing the right and good thing, and although they weren’t rewarded for their sacrifices in this life, we who live after them are the beneficiaries of who they were and what they did.

Chapter 8

In This Chapter

• Katniss, Peeta and Haymitch team up to save Gale
• Katniss reflects on the indecency of all Game victors, including herself

Katniss screams and runs forward to block the blow. It lands on her arms and face instead, and she falls, blinded from the pain.

Just then, Haymitch pushes through, stumbling over an injured Peacekeeper lying on the ground, who turns out to be redheaded Darius.

Haymitch grabs Katniss and moans: “Oh excellent…She’s got a photo shoot next week modeling wedding dresses. What am I supposed to tell her stylist?”

(A great example of Haymitch’s cleverness and survival instincts at play here. If he stepped forward and condemned the peacemaker for being cruel and unjust, he’d get them all in deeper trouble. Instead, he pretends his primary concern is Katniss’ face, which confounds and confuses the new Head Peacekeeper).

When the Peacekeeper protests that Katniss has “interrupted the punishment of a confessed criminal,” Haymitch says: “I don’t care if she blew up the blasted Justice Building! Think that will be camera ready in a week?”

“That’s not my problem,” the man says, but Katniss can sense a bit of doubt coming in, as Haymitch continues the attack:

“Well it’s about to be, my friend. The first call I will make when I get home is to the Capitol…Find out who authorized you to mess up my victors’ pretty little face!”

(Very smart, Haymitch. Sometimes the best lie is the boldfaced lie. Not that this is a lie, exactly, but the principle remains — distract by attacking)

And now Peeta steps in and says “He’s her cousin. And she’s my fiancee. So if you want to get to him, expect to go through both of us.”

(See, this is something you can’t quite see Gale doing, if the roles were flipped.)

And then a woman in the crowd, Katniss calls Purnia, says “I believe, for a first offense, the required number of lashes has been dispensed, sir.”

“Is that the standard protocol here?” asks the Peacekeeper, and Purnia nods, as does several others. Katniss notes:

“I’m sure none of them actually know because, in the Hob, the standard protocol for someone showing up with a wild turkey is for everybody to bid on the drumsticks.”

(Ha! At this dark, dramatic moment, Katniss’ snarky voice / commentary works really well)

The Head Peacekeeper acquiesces and a small group helps carry both Darius away while Katniss and Peeta and Haymitch cut Gale free and, with the help of a few others, carry him home to Katniss’ mother, the healer. Katniss sends a neighbor to fetch Gale’s mom Hazelle.

As they walk home, the neighbors fill Katniss in on what happened — Gale went to Cray’s house to sell the turkey, but found a new Peacekeeper, Romulus Thread.

No one knows what happened to Cray. Thread put Gale under arrest and he was immediately subjected to 40 lashes. Darius tried to interfere halfway through, and got hit.

Katniss watches in awe as her mother transforms into a healer right before her eyes, “this is the only time I think my mother knows who she is,” Katniss thinks as her mom and Prim prepare medicines to treat Gale’s mutilated back and try to save his life.

(It’s kind of hard for us modern people to imagine, because public whippings have long been outlawed in our society, but in times and places where they were a thing, whippings really could kill, from blood loss and shock.)

Katniss hopes that Gale remains unconscious to avoid feeling the pain, but he starts to wake, and Katniss panics, screaming at her mom to give Gale the full dose pain medication instead of the herbal concoction she and Prim are deciding on.

Katniss’ mother has Haymitch and Peeta take her away — literally carry her out of the room “while I shout obscenities at her” — and pin her to a bed until she stops struggling.

After a bit, Katniss’ mother comes in and treats Katniss’ face as she talks to Haymitch, who says “Who’d have thought we’d ever be sorry to see old Cray go?”

And Katniss recalls how Cray’s worst trait was his penchant for taking advantage of desperate young women, which “made him an object of loathing in the district.”

(Exactly. This is really sad, and really depraved, but it’s really true that desperate women often do sell themselves like this in order to survive or help their loved ones survive, and often disgusting people will take advantage of that desperation. 

(In a Hunger Games society, where some people are starving while others are literally entertained by watching kids fight to the death, of COURSE this kind of prostitution is going on as well. Collins just has to be careful not to be too explicit about it, since this book series is geared for young adults. 

(But this is another reason why terms like “sex work” are just trying to put lipstick on pig…or more like lipstick on a pig-sized cockroach. There’s nothing neutral or redeemable about this. This is not a good way to live, for anyone, no matter how desperate or not, which is why those who take advantage of women willing to do it ARE despicable, and, as Katniss says, “loathed.” Deservedly so.)

Katniss notes that if she’d been older when her father died, and if she hadn’t learned to hunt, she might have been one of those desperate young women herself.

The doorbell rings, and it turns out to be Madge, with a box of morphling, a Capitol medication that brings Gale instant pain relief. Peeta and Haymitch comment that they didn’t know Madge knew Gale, and all Katniss says is “she’s my friend.”

But it disturbs Katniss that she feels a sense of anger at “the implication that there’s something going on between Gale and Madge.”

(Fair is fair, I suppose. Katniss has been causing envy and jealousy galore in both Peeta and Gale…albeit in different ways…and now she gets a taste of her own medicine. The thing is, of course, none of it is any of these characters’ fault. No one is deliberately trying to hurt anyone else, but it’s just what happens because of the positions the authors have placed them in).

Having finished treating Gale, Katniss’ mother sends Haymitch, Peeta, and Gale’s mother home and Katniss alone sits up with Gale, observing him as he sleeps and recalling their past.

She starts thinking about how she would feel if their positions were reversed — if Gale had volunteered for his brother and started a fake romance on screen with a fellow tribute in order to save his life.

“The hatred I feel for him, for the phantom girl, for everything, is so real and immediate that it chokes me. Gale is mine. I am his. Anything else is unthinkable.”

(Katniss and Gale are REALLY alike in personality, with only slight variations. This is how Katniss realizes how Gale feels when she runs this thought experiment. 

(But this is also why the two of them don’t work together in the context they are in. With the backdrop of rebellion and war, two fiery characters together will burn themselves and everyone else up, too completely)

Katniss concludes that she is selfish, “the kind of girl who, when she might actually be of use, would run to stay alive and leave those who couldn’t follow to suffer and die…No wonder I won the Games. No decent person ever does.”

Katniss thinks that at least she saved Peeta, but even that move is called into question when she knows that “life back in District 12 would be unlivable if I let that boy die.”

(In other words, and in the words of an ancient prophet: “all of our good deeds are filthy rags.” Meaning, people tend to give themselves too much credit. We aren’t altruistic, really. All the “good” things we do usually have an underlying selfish motive, perhaps even hidden from ourselves. 

(That doesn’t mean we should stop doing good when we can, but that we need to be careful to figure out what IS good to do, and also not to develop ANY moral pride over ANY good that we do, knowing that there’s almost certainly a selfish reason behind it. 

(Also, Katniss makes a wise observation about “no one decent” ever winning the Games. Given the setup of the Games, she’s absolutely right: all of the winners by definition must be murderers. Not just killers, but murderers. Because a decent person would refuse to kill children at all, allowing themselves to die rather than betray their values. 

(And actually, it’s said that this IS how the gladiator games in ancient Rome ended — an old monk named Telemachus attempted to stop a fight in the arena, and the angry crowd stoned him to death. But that death led to people waking up and realizing the cruelty of the games — which had previously seemed less cruel thanks to the forces of entertainment and banality.)

Katniss still can’t figure out why she held out the berries at the end of the Game last year. She thinks about how even in District 12, life is like the arena: “At some point, you have to stop running and turn aroudn and face whoever wants you dead. The hard thing is finding the courage to do it.”

She leans forward to kiss Gale, which makes him half-wake up. “Thought you’d be gone by now,” he says, and Katniss responds: “I’m not going anywhere. I’m going to stay right here and cause all kinds of trouble.”

Comments & Analysis

Opening: “No!” I cry, and spring forward. It’s too late to stop the arm from descending, and I instinctively know I won’t have the power to block it.

Closing: My choices are simple. I can die like quarry in the woods or I can die here beside Gale. “I’m not going anywhere. I’m going to stay right here and cause all kinds of trouble.” // “Me, too,” Gale says. He just manages a smile before the drugs pull him back under.

PROMISES & PAYOFFS

Promises:

• Something bad is going to happen to Cray, who has disappeared, and Darius, who was beaten.

Payoffs:

• Haymitch uses his famous cleverness with a good dose of audacity to help Katniss save Gale, much more successfully than when Darius tried earlier, apparently.
• Also, being introduced to Darius a little in an earlier chapter “pays off” here as we hear of how he tried to help Gale — but ultimately failed. And knowing a little about him previously makes us feel more badly for him than if he was just a random newly-introduced character.
• Peeta also gets in on the action, standing up for Gale, for Katniss’ sake.
• And then the people of District 12 also get in on the action, showing some compassion and tentatively standing up to the new Head Peacekeeper.

Complications:

• District 12’s old, relatively peaceble Peacekeepers are being replaced by brutal strangers, their lives are about to get a whole lot worse…

OTHER COMMENTS

• Very nice mini-plot here in one chapter with all the rising action, climaxes, and resolution. We start with Katniss proposing an escape and end with her deciding to stand and fight.
• Katniss is starting to learn that personal survival isn’t everything, and that sometimes it costs too much. She’s thinking bigger now, and this is an important theme for this book, especially once the actual Games begin.

Chapter 9

In This Chapter

• Life in Twelve gets worse for everyone.
• Katniss learns where courage comes from.

Katniss awakes to Peeta shaking her shoulder. She’s fallen asleep with her face on the table, still holding Gale’s hands.

Katniss observes: “I smell fresh bread and turn my stiff neck to find Peeta looking down at me with such a sad expression. I get the sense that he’s been watching us awhile.”

(See what I mean? Peeta’s reaction to Katniss+Gale is sadness, while Gale’s reaction to Katniss+Peeta is anger. It takes a stronger — more selfless — character to react with the former rather than the latter.)

Katniss tells Peeta that she’s not interested in running anymore, and he says he knows. She feels a bit helpless: “No matter what I do, I’m hurting someone.”

Katniss has a nightmare and wakes up wishing that Peeta were with her…”until I remember I’m not supposed to wish that anymore. I have chosen Gale and the rebellion, and a future with Peeta is the Capitol’s design, not mine.”

(Or so you think. Ever heard of a third way, Katniss?)

Katniss considers what it means to fight the Capitol. How swiftly brutal they can be. How even Prim will be in danger again. “I can’t let the Capitol hurt Prim,” Katniss thinks to herself, “And then it hits me. They already have.” They have killed her father, forced her to watch her sister murder to survive, and more.

Katniss thinks to herself that Prim and Rue are the reasons she needs to fight. “Yes

(This is the source of courage — when you love someone more than yourself and your own survival/well-being. As the GK Chesterton quote goes: 

(“The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him.” 

(Hate is a strong motivator and can give people superhuman energy — but it’s a destructive energy that consumes not only the enemy, but the person wielding the hate in the end. 

(But love overcomes hate. And that’s NOT just a pretty saying. It’s a literal truth that you can see happening in the real world, historically, on small and large scales. People work harder out of love for their work than out of a chip on their shoulder. People fight harder to protect those they love than to defeat those they hate. And so on.

(This is the core difference between Gale and Peeta — they are primarily driven by different motivations). 

Katniss heads downstairs and finds her mom and Prim tending to Gale. Katniss apologizes for screaming at her, and is quickly forgiven: “I’ve heard worse…You’ve seen how people are, when someone they love is in pain,” Katniss’ mom says.

Katniss asks where Peeta is, and is told he went home. She calls him to make sure he got back alright, and he tells her that he checked on Haymitch, built up his fire and left him bread. Katniss says she wants to talk to both of them, but they have to wait two days for the winter storm to “blow itself out,” during which Katniss helps tend to Gale and to her own injured face.

(Side note, I wonder that Peeta’s parents didn’t move with him to the Victor’s Village. Maybe it’s because they have a bakery to run, but they could have left it to the older sons…hmm)

First chance she gets, Katniss and Peeta drag Haymitch with them away from the Victor’s Village for a private chat. When Katniss says she wants to start an uprising, Haymitch laughs.

“It’s not even a mean laugh, which is more troubling,” Katniss notes.

As they talk they see a blaze in the distance, it’s the Hob being burned to the ground. In the past few days, the new Head Peacekeeper, Thread, has gotten busy, bringing in more peacekeepers and building up public punishment paraphernalia everywhere.

They split up after that, with Haymitch going to see if he can buy rubbing alcohol to drink instead of alcohol (Katniss and Peeta agree when he’s out of earshot not to let him do that — both have stored away white liquor just in case), and Katniss heads to Gale’s house to check on his mom Hazelle, with Peeta tagging along.

After that, they walk by the Hob, and Katniss is shocked by the utter destruction and the fact that she recognizes none of the new Peacekeepers. The mines stay closed, the people start to starve, everything is getting harder for everyone. But at least Haymitch hires Hazelle as housekeeper “resulting in some extra money for her and greatly increasing Haymitch’s standard of living.”

Everyone avoids Katniss now, but more and more sick and injured people are brought to her mother, and the woods are completely forbidden until one morning, Katniss is driven out…by the arrival of a crate of wedding dresses personally approved by Snow.

Stunned by the fact that the wedding is still on, Katniss makes her way to the lake in the woods, but when she arrives, she sees a couple Peacekeepers.

Katniss begins to run, but is stopped in her tracks when the female Peacekeeper is holding out something — a cracker with a mockingjay stamped on it.

Comments & Analysis

Opening: Someone gives my shoulder a shake and I sit up. I’ve fallen asleep with my face on the table.

Closing: It’s a small white circle of flat bread. More of a cracker, really. Gray and soggy around the edges. But an image is clearly stamped in the center of it. // It’s my mockingjay.

PROMISES & PAYOFFS

Promises:

Payoffs:

Complications:

• Katniss can’t resolve the love triangle, it is just causing pain all around to Peeta and Gale, directly, and to herself, indirectly.

OTHER COMMENTS

• We’ve gone through an entire third of the book and no games have started yet, but this setup is important. We have to see the fallout from Katniss’ and Peeta’s actions in the first games, see how their family and friends have been and are being affected — not only by the Games but by the society as a whole.
• Because when you have something wicked going on, like the Hunger Games, you can bet your boots that there’s a deeper evil underneath, creating this phenomenon. And for Katniss to truly “win” the games, it isn’t enough for her to win in the arena. She has to address the bigger problem, which is the whole tyrannical society itself.
• Of course, she can’t do this by herself, which is why we as readers need to get to know the supporting cast in this story better, because they’re about to play an important role in the rest of the tale.
• A note about courage: I think true courage is differentiated from reckless daring by its underlying motivation. Those who are brave aren’t just those who overcome fears, but those who overcome fears because they love someone more than they fear whatever they are afraid of.
• This is what Katniss realizes. She starts by being terrified that the Capitol is going to hurt her little sister. Her love for Prim is noble, but narrow. As she learns to let her love encompass others, as well as Prim’s future and not just Prim’s immediate physical survival, she finds the courage to fight back against the Capitol deliberately.

Writing Tips & Practical Application

Because learning doesn’t happen until you change something you do…

• Create your own love triangle! Yay!: Haha. To be honest, it’s not my favorite trope, but gotta admit love triangles are pretty effective for building tension, grabbing attention, and getting readers involved (if you do them well enough that readers aren’t just rolling their eyes the entire time).
  So it’s probably not a bad idea to spend some time playing with the trope, just sketching out ideas for what you’d do if you were to create a love triangle, and then play around with different ramifications. Try to make the triangle completely ridiculous…extremely believable…trope-defying…etc.
• Study tyrannical historical societies: A lot of people today throw around the word “fascist” or “tyrant” without knowing really what that means. It’s not fun to study the dark side of human history, even less fun to experience it, but it can be an educating experience.
  It would behoove writers — especially those who are interested in writing dystopia — to study some dystopian-like societies and times in history to make their own worldbuilding more real. And don’t just limit it to the most obvious Nazi era, French Revolution, WWI, etc., but look into the lesser known Chinese Cultural Revolution, for example, or Russian Revolution or Cambodian Killing Fields, Holodomor, etc. Ancient history might be a great source to plumb, as well.