Sunrise on the Reaping (The Hunger Games)

by Suzanne Collins

“All propaganda is lies, even when one is telling the truth. I don’t think this matters so long as one knows what one is doing, and why.” — George Orwell

“A truth that’s told with bad intent Beats all the lies you can invent.” — William Blake

“Nothing appears more surprising to those, who consider human affairs with a philosophical eye, than the easiness with which the many are governed by the few; and the implicit submission, with which men resign th...

When we enquire by what means this wonder is effected, we shall find, that, as Force is always on the side of the governed, the governors ha...

It is therefore, on opinion only that government is founded; and this maxim extends to the most despotic and most military governments, as well as to the...

“That the sun will not rise tomorrow is no less intelligible a proposition, and implies no more contradiction, than the affirmati...

No way to control the outcome of the reaping or what follows it. So don’t feed the nightmares. Don’t let yourself panic. Don’t give the Capitol that. They’ve taken enough already.

I have to agree and, though I’m not a drinker myself, I’m glad to get the bottle.

Well, half for the dead girl called Lenore in this old poem and half for a shade of gray, which I found out the day I met her.

She wasn’t one of Burdock’s Everdeen cousins, but I knew he had some distant ones on his ma’s side.

“I’m Haymitch.” “I’m Lenore Dove.” “Dove like the bird?” “No. Dove like the color.” “What color’s that?” “Same as the bird.”

Dove color: Warm gray with a slight purplish or pinkish tint. Her color. Her bird. Her name.

Clerk Carmine and her other uncle, Tam Amber, have raised her since her ma died in childbirth, seeing her pa’s always been something of a mystery. They’re not blood kin, her being a Baird, but the Covey look out for their own.

“And that’s part of our trouble. Thinking things are inevitable. Not believing change is possible.” “I guess. But I can’t really imagine the sun not rising tomorrow.”

They have to keep it quiet because loving differently can get you harassed by the Peacekeepers, fired from jobs, arrested even. Given his own challenges, you’d think Clerk Carmine would be a champion of our love — I’m certainly supportive of his — but I guess he thinks Lenore Dove could do better.

She isn’t crying, so Plutarch won’t get his tearful good-bye. Not from her and not from me. They will not use our tears for their entertainment.

I love you like all-fire. I mouth back, You, too.

In fifty years, we’ve only had one victor, and that was a long time ago. A girl who no one seems to know anything about. Back then, barely anyone in 12 had a television, so the Games were mostly hearsay. I’ve never seen her in the clips of the old shows, but then those early efforts are rarely featured, as they are said to be badly filmed and lacking in spectacle. My parents weren’t born yet, and even Mamaw couldn’t tell me much about the girl. I brought our victor up with Lenore Dove a few times, but she never wanted to discuss her.

You are on a high horse, mister. And someday someone will knock you off it straight into your grave.

Then I gesture to him and begin to applaud, giving credit where credit is due. Spin this, Plutarch, I think.

She’d found a blind spot, and although they’d come raging within a few feet of her, she avoided detection. She just sat there, quiet as a mouse, eating, drinking from the lake, and sleeping curled up in a ball.

It’s Mags, a victor from District 4. She looks at me sadly, knowingly, and then opens up her arms and says, “I’m so sorry about Louella, Haymitch.” For a moment, I teeter between anger and grief. But the dam finally breaks. I step into her embrace, drop my head on her shoulder, and begin to cry.

And while Lenore Dove will forever be my true love, Louella is my one and only sweetheart.

What was it Ampert said about Louella last night? “She’s the one you made President Snow own?”

by reminding the audience that we’re human beings. The way they talk about us . . . piglets . . . beasts. They called my fingernails claws. You saw how those kids outside the gym looked at us. Like they think of us as animals. And they think of themselves as superior. So it’s okay to kill us. But the people in the Capitol aren’t better than us. Or smarter.”

First avoid the slaughter, Get weapons, look for water. Find food and where to sleep, Fire and friends can keep.

A cold dread washes over me as the puzzle pieces come together. Ampert is neither a lunatic nor a liar. His father has accompanied him to the Capitol because he’s a victor. And therefore a mentor, assigned to coach his own child to his death in the Fiftieth Hunger Games.

course, it’s unclear in the poem if nepenthe’s the liquor or the drug added to the liquor,” he continues. I remember having this same discussion with Lenore Dove. She said quaff means to drink, usually something with alcohol. And the guy telling the story in the song is trying to stop thinking about how he lost his true love. “I think the important part is it makes you forget terrible things,”

Louella’s death changed me. Maybe I’ll end up being victor material after all.

“Not an illness. Food poisoning. A batch of bad oysters. But I’ve fared far better than Incitatus Loomy.” “The parade master?” asks Plutarch, a funny look crossing his face. “Was he?”

During the Dark Days, people burned books to stay alive. We certainly did. But not the Heavensbees. They remained stinking rich, even when the best families were reduced to squalor.”

His insult disturbs me less than his familiarity with District 12. Miners soaked in rotgut liquor from the Hob — that’s us, all right. The worst of us, anyway.

He knows Lenore Dove is Covey; only they name their children this way. First name from a ballad, second a color. Amber and Ivory are actual family names. How has he unearthed this obscure fact about a pocket of musicians in the throwaway district of 12? Capitol informers?

“They’re peaceful.” “If they are, they’re outliers. All the birds I’ve encountered are vicious.”

“Like she’s delightful to look at, swishes around in bright colors, and sings like a mockingjay. You love her. And oh, how she seems to love you. Except sometimes you wonder, because her plans don’t include you at all.”

You know, my family has its own little aphorism.” “What’s that?” “Snow lands on top.”

“Best guess . . . child of traitors. Could be either district or Capitol. She might not even know herself. No question they’ve programmed her. Probably drugged her as well.”

“You’re my hero. I hope I’m just like you when I grow up. Oh, wait a minute, that won’t be happening.”

there’s Maysilee, kneeling across from the girl, mixing up some white gooey stuff on a leaf with a twig. She doesn’t ask permission, she just carefully arranges the broken pieces into their original form, then begins to smear goo on the edges and glue the sunflower back together. And all of 9 just stands there, speechless, letting her.

To paint myself as a selfish troublemaker who’s determined to get home and live out his life as a rich and famous victor.

At least the Trinkets aren’t mean, just clueless, which makes for a big improvement over Drusilla and Magno.

For a moment, they’re just two girls on a mission to beautify the world. Effie holds up a compact for her opinion. “I’m thinking maybe a peach?”

“You deserve to look beautiful tonight,” Effie replies. “And I think you’re all being very brave.” We don’t have much choice, but it’s nice to have someone recognize it.

“We know that,” says Wellie, eyes full of trust. Too much trust. I need to distance myself from them for the good of everybody.

Lucky hosted with commentary from a relic of a woman named Gaul, who was credited with coining the phrase “May the odds be EVER in your favor”

if you think about it, it’s a sadistic thing to say to a tribute, given that survival’s an impossibility for twenty-three of the twenty-four kids.

The Capitol citizens lose it and so do I, until I remember the joke’s not just on Panache. It’s on all of us stupid, clawed district piglets. Animals for their entertainment. Expendable for their pleasure. Too dumb to deserve to live.

“I don’t see that it makes much difference. They’ll still be one hundred percent as stupid as usual, so I figure the odds will be roughly the same.”

“Like in one of your songs, my ghost will hunt down your ghost and never give it a moment’s rest.” “Promise?” She sounds a little more hopeful. “Because if I could count on that, I think I could bear it. But what I can’t bear is . . . what if we’re never together again?”

You and me, we will find each other, as many times as it takes.”