Catching Fire

Collins, S. (2009).  Catching Fire. New York: Scholastic Press.

In the second book of the Hunger Games Series, Catching Fire, we find Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark heading out on the victory tour train after their win at the games.  In District 11, Katniss finds the people giving the sign that she gave when she buried Rue in flowers.  She finds that she has begun an unrest in Rue's district that she cannot stop.  She does not even know if she wants to try.  The scary part for her is that she must make President Snow think that she and Peeta are madly in love.  

Then comes the announcement, there will be a Quarter Quell.  It is the 75th Anniversary of the Hunger Games.  What they don't know about it is how they will choose the players.  Then the next announcement comes as a shock; the players for the Quarter Quell will come from the surviving members from each prior game.  That meant that Katniss, Peeta and Haymitch would make up the candidates from District 12. 

The games are set to begin and Katniss and Peeta are groomed to go back into the arena. During the training sessions, Katniss tries to make friends with some of the other tributes but decides she only wants to make sure Peeta gets home alive. Katniss, Peeta, Finnick, Johanna, and Beetee team up to try to survive.  They devise a plan to get rid of the others and then plan to blow up the force field that surrounds the arena.   They are all removed from the arena.  Katniss is taken to District 13 and Peeta is captured and taken to the Capitol.  She doesn't know if he is alright or not.  

In this book, Katniss and Peeta become closer to each other.  They  know they can trust each other but can they trust any of the other tributes.  She finds that she is now the mockingjay and District 12 is no more.                                        

 This book was on the New York Times Bestseller List for more than a year.

Exposition:  The sequel to Hunger Games brings back our hero Peeta and heroine Katniss who are still reeling from the first games and are back at District 12.  

Conflict:  Katniss is threatened by President Snow to quelch the rebellion that has begun since she and Peeta won the games 9 months ago.  She stops a Peacekeeper from flogging Gale to death and gets hit on the face with the whip.

Rising Action:  Katniss fights her real love for Gale and her undesired love for Peeta as she is pulled into the game yet again.  She decides to help Peeta come out on top this time.  They train and watch films of the other players, some of them are champions from up to 50 years ago. They realize that most of these champions are too old to really be competition.

Climax:  During the games they realize that they are in a dome with an electrified force field surrounding it.  They also find that each spoke of the wheel that they were on when  they started, was actually the face of a clock.  If you were in a section during a certain time you could end up dead.

Falling Action: After a while, Katniss realizes that everyone in their party wants to keep Peeta alive.  She teams up with those who are on the same page as she is.  When things go wrong she shoots an arrow with the electrical wire through the force field flaw and that ends the game.  A hovercraft picks her up and takes her hurting bleeding body away.  She hopes Peeta got away.

Resolution:  Katniss has been asked to be the Mockingjay, the spokesperson for District 13, that will help the other districts to take down the Capital.  She will only do it if those captured by the Capital are freed and given their freedom.  She is obsessed with her hatred for President Snow.

Literary Elements:  The imagery is masterfully inserted into the writing element.

Point of view - third person limited omniscient - We only know what is going on with Kat through the entire story.