Life of Bry

“At some point, you have to stop running and turn around and face whoever wants you dead.The hard thing is finding the courage to do it.”

Catching Fire, Suzanne Collins

Catching Fire *reread*

5 ⭐️

I didn’t expect to cry during a reread but Catching Fire made me weep multiple times. Collins knows how to work a narrative in this very simplistic but impactful way. It’s like needlework — delicate but intricate. I love it. 

Watching Katniss transform is a work of art. From a dainty girl into a spark and then an inferno. Peeta creeping more and more into a rebel. Gale’s anger catching and burning. It’s all so perfect. 

Anyway, here are my thoughts while reading Catching Fire.

• I love how Suzanne Collins really takes “show don’t tell” to heart, especially when it comes to character development. From the first page, the shift in Katniss’ priorities is evident. She wakes up in THG looking for Prim, because caring for Prim is all she cares about. However, in Catching Fire, she allows herself to think about her — dreading the prep team and the Victory Tour, worrying about Snow, thinking about what Peeta and Gale mean to her. Prim is safe, but she isn’t. 

• Peeta is a rebel at heart. Katniss is the Mockingjay, but Peeta is a quiet force. And he might be even more strategic. Katniss’ ‘rebellions’ have been more off the cuff desperation attempts — like the berries or Rue’s death. But Peeta intentionally sets the Capitol off with his interview bombs. Not to mention announcing the donations to the District 11 families. Even his mentality of not letting himself become a pawn in the Games is rebellious. Katniss does play their Games, but Peeta never does. His humanity unmasks the Capitol’s cruelty.
• Perfect foreshadowing with Plutarch’s watch and the midnight meeting for strategy. Chef’s kisses.
• ”Life in District 12 isn’t really so different from life in the Arena. At some point you have to stop running and turn around and face whoever wants you dead. The hard thing is finding the courage.”
  • You never leave the arena because each district is its own arena you have to survive.
• Gale wanted to run first. When he thought they had no hope. We do what we need to survive. Running. Fighting. But also, Katniss is a natural-born rebel. In THG we learned she used to talk shit with Gale in the woods. Plus, she had the courage to do what it takes to win The Hunger Games and do it with as much humanity as she could. That’s what makes her a spark.
• I loved seeing Katniss let her mother and Prim take care of her for once. A switching of roles.
  • also Prim seeming so much older is a byproduct of safety. Katniss doesn’t have to worry about Prim starving, so she can see her outside of that duty.
• Peeta telling Katniss the rest of the victors see her as too pure was so funny but also so true. She’s so innocent not because her hands are clean but because her survival was the focus for so long she couldn’t think of something like sexuality or sensuality.
• Katniss is surprised the Victors are so easy to get along with and they are her in different forms. They all share the commonality of being wronged by the Capitol over and over again. 
• Peeta making the GameMakers hold themselves responsible for Rue’s death 👏👏👏 This isn’t a Game. This is life. They are murderers. Make them think about it.
• “To show them that I’m more than just a piece in their Games.” *Sobs*
• Everyone (Haymitch) acts as if Katniss is so unlikeable but I just don’t get it. She’s an average girl. And everyone who works closely with her tends to endear themselves to her. Her adaptability and purity makes it so easy. I literally sobbed over Venia telling Katniss it was an honor to make her look her best. It hit me hard.

• The Victors have nothing to lose. Of course they’d rebel. What was Snow thinking? Wait I know what he was thinking, that he owned the Victors. That the winnings would tie their hands. The generosity would close their mouths when death is days away.
• Katniss’ wedding dress burning away into the Mockingjay dress was symbolic of her burning away the girl the Capitol wanted her to be. No more ribbons and pastel dresses. She’s the Girl on Fire.
• Still love the fact the Capitol kills 23 fully alive children every year but get in an uproar over the potential of hurting on unborn baby. The irony.
  • Plus Celia had three kids. They don’t matter.
• ”Remember, girl on fire, I’m still betting on you.” Those being Cinna’s last words haunts me.
• It just hit me this reread how in catching fire Peeta tells the dying morphling he hasn’t figure out how to paint a rainbow yet because they fade too quickly. How rainbows symbolize promise and hope. In the biblical sense, god sends the rainbow as a promise to Noah never to flood the earth again — a sign that the cruelty has come to an end. A sign of hope because rainbows mean the storm has past. But peeta hasn’t experienced enough rainbows. Not long enough at least. Brief respites of hope in victory, in kisses, in hands held, in heads on chests. Always fading away as yet another storm rolls in.
• The Capitol was always the enemy. Always.
• Is the end of CF a callback to THG with Katniss looking for Prim?? Or is it awful foreshadowing that makes me want to throw up??? …. “Prim?”

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