Sunrise On The Reaping - Blog Posts
y’all haffie shippers are working overtime to try to make it seem cannon after sotr
Sunrise over District 12
Haymitch Abernathy - Lenore Dove Baird - Maysilee Donner
Burdock Everdeen - Asterid March - Merrilee Donner
Wyatt Callow - Louella McCoy - Otho Mellark
for the rare and radiant maiden
whom the angels name Lenore— 🕊️
No because WHAT do you mean Johnny Sinclair and Haymitch Abernathy are going to be played by the same actor??
The way Haymitch constantly had to reassure us that he "only liked Maysilee as a sister" was kinda annoying. Can you tell Suzanne doesn't want them to be shipped together?
Isttfg, it's like when Nina Dobrev left The Vampire Diaries, and Bonnie and Damon had to refer to each other as "my best friend" every fucking time they shared a frame.
I have a lot of complaints about THG, even more about SOTR. But I really, really appreciate Suzanne Collins making orange the colour of the revolution.
Finished reading Sunrise on the Reaping in the morning and it absolutely destroyed me and had me sobbing. I’m still pretty sad after reading and my eyes are hot and puffy even though it’s been hours.
I started reading it yesterday and I ended up crying myself to sleep after I finished reading chapter 18. Then I started chapter 19 this morning and finished the book at around 12:58 or at 1:00. Started sobbing violently, snot running down my nose as I finished it… heh.
No wonder my eyes are puffy I’ve been crying for a whole day straight
Im back
Lol hey yall. This semester was crazy, but I finished my finals and all I gotta do is walk the stage. Since I have yet to find a job I have PLENTY of time. Ive read one or two books over the time I've been gone.
The silent patient.
If we were villains.
I got onyx storm (havent read yet bc xaden and violet were so insufferable in iron flame that I got put off but it will be read.)
And I'm halfway through The Poppy War.
Oh, and I finished Sunrise on the reaping.
Once I get my bearings, aka my personal library and reading lists, I'll start back doing my reviews but I'm kind of conflicted on HOW id like to continue.
Do we like the two parts where it's the characters then the plot separately, or should I make it just one long post???? Like, how are we feeling about this. I don't have a lot of followers here but I'm hoping for some feedback to make reading these thoughts and reviews better for yall so just LMK!
Also, should I review ACOTAR? It's been a few years since I've even touched the series, and I'd need to re-read it to get all of my thoughts out but is that something yall would want my yaps on?
There are so many books I have read that I wanted to talk about, but I'd have to go back and re-read bc id rather it be fresh on the mind. But anyways.
I say all this to say I'm back and I'm gonna try to put myself on a schedule to post reviews. I'll do random posts in between, but the main events ill try to put on a bi-weekly schedule depending on what life throws at me. So be on the lookout!
also people need to realise that 'the hunger games' is not about a 16-year old starting a revolution, it is about adults in power using children for their political games! both for better or worse!
the way haymitch and katniss's father were friends. the way burdock held him from running into the fire. the way him and blair stayed at haymitch's victor's house. the way asterid gave haymitch sleep syrup. the way burdock and asterid were the last ones to keep contact with haymitch, trying to ease his grief. the way it took haymitch hurting asterid for them to leave him. the way burdock showed him lenore's grave, which he probably found long ago, instantly thinking of haymitch, but not telling him because he's not forgotten what he's done. the way haymitch saw how proud burdock was of katniss. the way his best friend died after haymitch himself pushed him away. the way he saw young katniss step into his role of providing for her family. the way haymitch had to take care of burdock's daughter. the way he saw himself, burdock, lenore and louella in her. the way he let her in his heart anyway. the way 'sweetheart' slipped out. the way through katniss, he's finally fulfilled his promise to lenore.
okay, so I've finished "sunrise on the reaping" and omg
this book kills me. even though I knew the ending, I didn't know how exactly it was going to end. now that's really devastating. haymitch really went through it all.
the book had a couple of slips here and there, but overall, it was good. i loved making connections to the rest of the series. i'm also really invested in this generation now. i'd love to read at least a short story about Katniss's parents. i would also love to read a little bit of the og trilogy from haymitch's and peeta's perspective. the epilogue moved me.
4.75/5
FROM NOW ON MY FAVOURITE CHARACTER DYNAMIC IS FOUND SIBLINGS
I'm currently reading "sunrise on the reaping" (only like 4 chapters left) and oh my god how I am loving the characters
they all are just so wholesome and too pure for this world😭😭😭😭 I'm really invested in this generation of tributes. It's also really interesting to watch more cooperative tributes, I kinda wish we could see more of others working together. or maybe I'm acting a little bit as capitol public watching the games lol
MAYSILEE DONNER THE WOMAN THAT YOU ARE! she's really become my favourite
lowkey should've won the games. and i have such a vivid picture of her in my head like in a movie! ugggh i wish i was good at drawing people. guess it's time to look for some fanart
also, I'm trying to picture haymitch book-accurate, but his movie appearance keeps popping up in my head, and only now, when I'm already finishing the book, I can finally kinda imagine him properly😭😭😭
Heyyy can we talk about how in the hunger games Katie’s is also the mockingjay because she echoes the efforts of those who came before her. Like she is a parallel to Sam many people, mainly Lucy gray and Haymitch who both tried and failed to break the games, and sort of her identity as the mockingjay is to echo the songs of those who came before her- both literal songs, and their actions. Oh also the thing she wore that gave her her name, the mockingjay pin, was inherited from both Lenore Dove and Maysilee, effectively continuing their stories and honoring them… yaknow just saying
effie trinket i will forever love you! here are some sketches i did of outfits i think she’d wear bc she is a camp glam fashion girl and i love drawing clothes
if i could sew i would be a fashion designer trust
SOTR characters! i cried so bad reading this book i had mascara streaming down my face.
pictured are haymitch, lenore dove, maysilee, wyatt, louella, lou lou, burdock, and asterid
i’m planning on doing more i’m just kinda burnt out after drawing so much LOL
people enjoyed these on tiktok so i thought id share here too! here are my hunger games character drawings! (katniss, peeta, rue, haymitch, effie, prim, and gale)
i tried to be more book accurate but these are just how i imagined them when i read the books (i have to reread soon…)
i also told this story on tiktok but when i was younger i overheard my sister talking to her friends about the hunger games and i was totally confused and scared because i thought it was like a reality game show where they were killing children 😭😭😭
anyways i love tumblr guys everyone is so fun and talented
But this happened right before I deleted my instagram everyone, this is the best day of my life!
The way we see the full progression of the dehumanisation of the tributes as the Hunger Games becomes more established and more normalised in the Capitol
In Ballad, they’re like wild animals, caged and starved as a form of revenge
In Sunrise, Haymitch being likened to some kind of pet by his prep team and in the afterparty of the games
In The Hunger Games and Catching Fire, they’re like celebrities trapped in a sick parasocial relationship with the people who will, in a week, get to see them die
The cage is always there- it just evolves to make it more palatable to the viewers
Something i didnt quite understand in the book is why in the arena they had to kill the game makers is theres any bigger piece to it or is it just pure brutality?
Thanks for your ask!
The answer comes from a few different places, but it ultimately leads back to David Hume’s essay Of the First Principles of Government. (It's a short read, and I highly recommend it!)
In Of the First Principles of Government, Hume discusses implicit submission. He maintains governing bodies derive their power from public opinion, and it is exactly why all of the characters acted the way they did in that scene. I will break it down by character, but first I want to examine some context in SOTR.
In the text, the training scene right before Plutarch begins to question Haymitch foreshadows the later scene:
“There’s this moment, just as I get to my feet, where I look around, and I’m armed, and they’re armed. A half dozen of us hold sleek, deadly knives. And I see that there aren’t many Peacekeepers here today. Not really. We outnumber them four to one. And if we moved quickly, we could probably free up some of those tridents and spears and swords at the other stations and have ourselves a real nice arsenal. I meet Ringina’s eyes, and I’d swear she’s thinking the same thing.” [...] “The more I think it over, the more my dismay grows. Every year we let them herd us into their killing machine. Every year they pay no price for the slaughter. They just throw a big party and box up our bodies like presents for our families to open back home.”
When you read this as context to the scene in the arena, it is the same idea. The armed tributes outnumber the Gamemakers, and in the arena, everyone is on equal footing. The tributes have the numbers and the momentum of days in the arena behind them.
There are two lines that are thematically significant in this section. The first line is from a Gamemaker:
The Gamemaker with the drill raises her mask and straightens up to a full height. "That’s right. And all four of you are in absolute violation of the rules. You must immediately withdraw or there will be repercussions." "That’d be a lot more impressive if you weren’t shaking like a leaf," observes Maysilee, fingering her blowgun.
The only defense the Capitol worker has is that of governing status. She attempts to assert the rules of governance on her side by claiming that they are all in violation of the rules, and therefore they must submit to the Capitol by leaving them alone. Even she knows, as her shaking voice exposes, there is no true way to enforce this rule. This is where David Hume’s essay comes in:
"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 have nothing to support them but opinion."
The force is always on the side of the governed. The governed, in this case, are the tributes of the arena. Yet, in the arena, where the purpose, according to Dr. Gaul, is to strip man down to his base instincts, a governing body cannot exist. The government exists to make sure man doesn’t regress to said instincts. Therefore, the government cannot exist in the arena in the same way it does in the rest of Panem. Ergo, the public opinion needed to enforce the rules is obsolete, to the point where both parties are on equal grounds. There is no illusion of power.
The second line is:
Silka seems stunned into inertia as well. “What’d you do? Did you kill Gamemmakers? They’ll never let us win now!”
Silka still believes there are winners in the games. In fact, she goes so far as to say “let us win”, thus she recognizes that the Capitol has true control over who wins, and prior to this, she expected to be able to win. Now, she believes winning is a right that the Capitol can revoke, which lends itself to the idea of Hume’s secondary principles of government:
"There are indeed other principles, which add force to these, and determine, limit, or alter their operation; such as self-interest, fear, and affection: But still we may assert, that these other principles can have no influence alone, but suppose the antecedent influence of those opinions above-mentioned."
Because Silka expects to be able to win, she is stunned into submission under her expectation of particular rewards:
"For, first, as to self-interest, by which I mean the expectation of particular rewards, distinct from the general protection which we receive from government, it is evident that the magistrate's authority must be antecedently established, at least be hoped for, in order to produce this expectation."
On the other side, fear stuns Haymitch. Hume details how fear is a form of submission:
"No man would have any reason to fear the fury of a tyrant, if he had no authority over any but from fear; since, as a single man, his bodily force can reach but a small way, and all the farther power he possesses must be founded either on our own opinion, or on the presumed opinion of others."
Haymitch recognizes how futile it would be to take down a few Gamemakers. It is the same reason he deduces when he reflects on his time in the training center. They may outnumber the peacekeepers in the training center, but what would happen? It would be a fruitless rebellion, and public opinion would squash anything that could potentially develop from it. Hume’s discussion of fear is not exactly fear of the tyrant himself, rather, fear of the power he possesses over others. Snow had public opinion on his side outside of the arena. Killing a few Gamemakers here would just bring upon the tyrant’s arsenal.
Maysilee and Maritte, however, both recognize that the perception of power via public opinion doesn’t exist in the arena. Both realize they cannot be punished more than they already are. I don’t usually quote the movies, but I think Reaper’s taunting of the Capitol when he rips the flag down in the 10th Games suits this philosophy extremely well:
“Are you gonna punish me now? Are you going to punish me now?”
Both girls act because they are disillusioned with the power of the Capitol. They refuse to submit. They are free from the secondary aspects of self-interest, fear, and affection. Maysilee alludes to the idea that winning was never going to happen in the first place:
Maysilee’s voice drips honey. “Still chasing that sad little dream, Silka?”
While one can interpret this by assuming Maysilee means she was going to kill Silka, it can also be taken to counter Silka’s belief of a fair win, calling it a dream. Maysilee likely recognizes the Capitol can always give advantages to people they want to win, or send mutts on whoever they don’t like. We see this with Titus in his games. She doesn’t submit.
I would like to cross reference this with the 10th Games in Ballad, where Coriolanus and Sejanus entered the arena. Dr. Gaul used Coryo’s experience in the arena about a lesson on human nature:
“Without the threat of death, it wouldn’t have been much of a lesson,” said Dr. Gaul. “What happened in the arena? That’s humanity undressed. The tributes. And you, too. How quickly civilization disappears. All your fine manners, education, family background, everything you pride yourself on, stripped away in the blink of an eye, revealing everything you actually are. A boy with a club who beats another boy to death. That’s mankind in its natural state.”
Later in the scene, she talks about how the death of Coryo and Sejanus would not have brought anyone closer to winning. This is the same idea, just from the perspective of what would have been the Gamemakers, had they survived:
“What did you think of them, now that their chains have been removed? Now that they’ve tried to kill you? Because it was of no benefit to them, your death. You’re not the competition.” It was true. They’d been close enough to recognize him. But they’d hunted down him and Sejanus — Sejanus, who’d treated the tributes so well, fed them, defended them, given them last rites! — even though they could have used that opportunity to kill one another. “I think I underestimated how much they hate us,” said Coriolanus. “And when you realized that, what was your response?” she asked. He thought back to Bobbin, to the escape, to the tributes’ bloodlust even after he’d cleared the bars. “I wanted them dead. I wanted every one of them dead.”
Interestingly, he makes a point about human nature that calls back to what Hume is saying:
“I think I wouldn’t have beaten anyone to death if you hadn’t stuck me in that arena!” he retorted. “You can blame it on the circumstances, the environment, but you made the choices you made, no one else. It’s a lot to take in all at once, but it’s essential that you make an effort to answer that question. Who are human beings? Because who we are determines the type of governing we need. Later on, I hope you can reflect and be honest with yourself about what you learned tonight.” Dr. Gaul began to wrap his wound in gauze.
While initially it seems to validate Dr. Gaul’s argument that humans, by nature, are violent creatures, his refutation actually provides the basis for the very reason Maysilee and Maritte killed the Gamemakers. “[They] wouldn’t have beaten anyone to death if [the Capitol] hadn’t stuck [them] in that arena”.
The arena does not strip people of their nature. It forces them to submit for the very secondary aspects Hume provides. The governing body forces them to kill, and by stepping into the arena, where the Capitol has stripped itself and all beings of their own power to display what it believes to be human nature in its primitive form, it has erased the protection of public opinion.
The Capitol holds no real power in the arena itself. Sure, they bomb it afterwards to clear out the four tributes. Sure, they sic the mutts on Maysilee and Maritte, but they do not govern in the way they do over Panem.
Inasmuch, the Gamemakers died because the arena disillusioned Maysilee and Maritte to their implicit submission. The moment the Gamemakers entered the arena, they were powerless as of their own creation.
I hope this makes sense. Thanks for the ask!
When Snow calls Lucy Gray "my girl": 😖😤🤬🤮🤮
When Haymitch calls Lenore Dove "my girl": 😊🥰😍😁✨
Wyatt Callow is the kind of guy who gives his friends flowers.
"Louella is my one and only sweetheart"
I wrote a fanfic about the day of the reaping, narrated by Maysilee. And I'm so proud!!! I only showed it to my sister, but I'm really happy hahaha and Idk I think I just wanted people on the internet to know (I'm not proud enough to post it now...)
But I really liked my Maysilee's POV fanfic, maybe I post it someday.
When Maysilee asks Haymitch if Merrilee will still be twins when she dies >>>>
I have a twin sister and I say: Yes, we will always be twins
I love my twin sister!
i still can't get over the line "A sister is someone you fight with and you fight for - tooth and nail." in SOTR. like i started sobbing when i read it and immediately had to text my sister about it. maysilee and haymitch no one could ever make me hate you 😭
I have the headcanon that Katniss’ kids keep bunnies as pets and one day, one of them dies from old age. That evening Katniss serves him up for dinner (food is food) and all hell breaks loose. The kids scream and cry, Peetah desperately tries to calm them down and Haymitch falls off his chair from laughing so hard while Katniss grumbles about how she doesn’t understand what they are on about.
After reading the Epilogue this headcanon is just cemented into my brain. I love her, but Katniss-I-tried-to-drown-my-sisters-cat-Everdeen would be fun to watch as a mother.
FINALLY finished sunrise on the reaping...
I'll be dumping a lot of thoughts on her soon
I think im at the point where imma just freakin BLOCK sunrise on the reaping tags and im not happy about it