2.     33 pages

The main character is Katniss Everdeen who is a 16 year old girl. She lives with her mom who is a nurse and her younger sister Primrose. Katniss and Gale go outside of their district and by climbing through in the whole of the fence that’s supposed to keep everyone inside their district. When they go out into the woods they go hunting to provide food for their families and talk about how life would be if they ran away from the district. It’s the day of reaping, which is the process of anyone over 12 years old has to enter their name to enter the hunger games. The hunger games is a fight to the death between two selected kids, a boy and girl, from each district. District 12’s drawing took place and in the drawing primrose’s name was drawn, however Katniss volunteered in her place. The boy tribute from district 12 is Peeta Mellark. Peeta Mellark is a town boy who is a baker. Katniss and Peeta have only met once and that was when Katniss and her family were on the brink of starving to death. Peeta purposely burnt loaves of bread and gave them to Katniss to feed her family. 

3.     The style of writing that Suzanne uses is first person. We see the very depressing life of the post-apocalyptic world through Katniss Everdeen’s eyes. In her writing Suzanne Collins uses sympathy by showing that Katniss lives in the slums and does everything she can to support her family. Collins alludes to famous examples of self-sacrifice such as the Titanic by having Katniss say “I volunteer as tribute!” and having her take Prim’s place. The Hunger Games is a young adult literature novel so the diction is very simple which helps Katniss’s character as an uneducated person.

 

abrueggenjohann[Andrew Brueggenjohann]. “Novel Blog #1.” Padlet, https://padlet.com/abrueggenjohann/se7yrpq7f98. Accessed 16 November 2017

2.     61 pages

Katniss and Peeta are taken into a room in the Justice Building. In these rooms they tell their families and friends goodbye. Prim and Katniss’s mom visit Katniss to tell her goodbye. Katniss talks to the two of them about surviving when she’s gone and how prim can survive off her goat and her mother can survive off her medicine practice. Peeta’s father is next to visit Katniss. His father makes a promise to Katniss to make sure Prim has enough to eat. Madge, one of Katniss’s good friends, gives Katniss a pin. The pin has a Mockingjay on it and Katniss promises to wear it in the arena. Gale then visits her last. He gives Katniss advice on how to stay alive and promises her that he will protect her family while she’s gone. When they’re done Katniss and Peeta go on the train to the capital. The train is very fancy and has showers and nice foods that Katniss has never seen before. Haymitch and Effie talk to them about the Hunger Games and show them previous clips of other Hunger Games. Peeta then helps drunk Haymitch through the night and Katniss notices that he does this out of pure kindness. She makes a mental note to not get involved with Peeta. Peeta, Katniss, and Haymitch have a fight over Haymitch’s poor advice and Haymitch agrees to stay sober enough to guide them. They arrive at the capital and see the wealth of all the capital people.

5.     A character that I find is very interesting is Haymitch. Haymitch is a protagonist who is very quiet, mean, and depressing man who is a drunk. He is the only person from district 12 to ever win the Hunger Games. He seems so interesting to me because Collins portrays him as a very wise man who doesn’t talk a lot. We know that he’s been through a lot in the Hunger Games and he has to see district 12 kids die every year in the arena. Haymitch is a round character because right now he is very quiet but I think later on we’ll be able to learn more about him and his background. Haymitch is a leader because he ends up deciding to help Peeta and Katniss “’All right, I’ll make a deal with you. You don’t interfere with my drinking, and I’ll stay sober enough to help you’” (Collins 58).

abrueggenjohann[Andrew Brueggenjohann]. “Novel Blog #1.” Padlet, https://padlet.com/abrueggenjohann/dzqv4rwym5e1. Accessed 21 November 2017

11 pages

2.     73 Pages

Katniss and Peeta are taken to the massive building called the remake center which is where they get prepped. A group of women from the capital who had modifications done to their bodies such as gold skin, aqua hair, and high pitch voices were working on Katniss. They were yanking strips of fabric from her legs tearing the hair out and scrubbed her body down with gritty soap which removed dirt and skin off of her. Katniss took Haymitch’s advice and took the pain and allowed the capital women to do their job. The names of the workers who prepped Katniss’s body were Venia, Octavia, and Flavius. All three of them did not look like normal human beings due to their skin modifications so Katniss is not self-conscious. Once the prep team is all done washing her they bring her to meet Cinna. Katniss notices right away that Cinna is normal looking and has normal hair and his normal black clothes. She asks Cinna if he is new to styling and finds out that it is his first year working for the hunger games and that he requested district 12. Katniss and Cinna go sit down on a couch and food magically appears in front of them and Katniss wonders how life would be like if food appeared in a click of a button. Then Cinna starts to think of what Peeta and Katniss will wear for the opening ceremonies. Katniss is afraid that they’ll have to wear something to do with mining but Cinna comes up with the idea to focus on fire and to wear burning outfits. The two get in their carriage and they barely feel the flames. The crowds of capital people love them and their outfits. She realizes that district 12 is the capitals favorite and gives Peeta a kiss on the cheek in front of everyone. 

4.     http://www.suzannecollinsbooks.com/

When you first enter Suzanne Collins web page you see a warming picture of Collins and a rat in Central Park. This really helps you warm up to the author because she leaves a note which gives a clue why she chose the rat, which is because rats are one of the main companions in the Gregor the Overlander series. Following the picture are a series of books including the Hunger Games series and her children’s novel Year of the Jungle. Underneath each novel are reviews from critics. Continuing onto her website there’s another tab which shows a list of all her works with an included brief summary. Another tab shows her biography which tells about her going through her life as a writer and the struggles and achievements she’s had. And in the last tab is an interview with Collins that asks questions related to her works.

5.     The time period that the hunger games were written in were the 2000’s. This time era really reflects onto the novel in many ways. The first thing that the 2000’s reflect on the Hunger Games is the issue of poverty and strict governments. During the 2000’s there were many countries that were in poverty that had governments that would not do anything to help their people. This is just like the hunger games how the Capital would keep all the districts significantly more rundown and poor than the capital itself. Another way that the 2000’s affect the novel is the main character. Female characters were scarce in the 80’s and 90’s and in the 2000’s we started seeing a trend of having more female characters in books and movies. Suzanne Collins must’ve thought that it was a good idea to follow this trend and made the main character a female.

6.     abrueggenjohann[Andrew Brueggenjohann]. “Novel Blog #1.” Padlet, https://padlet.com/abrueggenjohann/dzqv4rwym5e1. Accessed 26 November 2017

2.      102 pages

Katniss and Peeta go to the training center where each tribute gets its own training floor. On the training floor there are utilities and gadgets that will help them train for the games. Later that night at dinner Cinna and Portia joined Katniss, Peeta, Haymitch, and Effie. They all get along and watch more opening ceremonies and Katniss notices a servant girl that brings food. She says something about the girl and the girl denies it and Effie says it’s impossible for Katniss to know a traitor. Peeta gets her out of the mess saying that she looks like a girl from school. Later that night Peeta and Katniss go up and talk about the girl on the roof of the building. Katniss tells Peeta that she recognizes the girl from the woods when she and Gale were out hunting. The girl was being hunted down by the capital and right before she was captured she locked eyes with Katniss and Katniss didn’t do anything to help her. The next day is training day and they both request to get their training in together. Haymitch asks what each of their skills are and they both respond that they have no special skills. Peeta then says that Katniss has amazing hunting skills and is amazing with a bow and arrow. Then Katniss responds with saying that Peeta is very adept with hand to hand combat and can lift really heavy things from his experience from lifting flour bags. Peeta then admits that he and his parents don’t believe in those skills or if he’ll survive. In the training stations they work on knot-tying and camouflage as their skills. They meet a little girl named Rue from district 11 which reminds Katniss of Prim. Then after the training the tributes had to showcase their skills to the game makers. Katniss went very last of all tributes so the game makers were very tired and weren’t paying attention to her or her skills. She decides to grab their attention by shooting an arrow through the game makers roast pig and walks out.

3.      A character that I found was interesting throughout this chapter was Katniss. I thought she was interesting because of her feelings for Peeta. Katniss thinks that Peeta is playing it nice to gain her trust that way she’ll be weak in the games. However, she’s confused Peeta has always been a very kind person to her in her life. So I think that she is building some trust and is starting to develop feelings for him. One example where Katniss has showed emotion for Peeta is “’You should wear flames more often,’ he says. ‘They suit you.’ And then he gives me a smile that seems so genuinely sweet with just the right of shyness that unexpected warmth rushes through me” (Collins 72). 

4.      One of the biggest themes in the hunger games is the inequality between the rich and the poor. In the Hunger Games the rich do not have to participate in the Hunger Games. They are also given luxurious lifestyles and are granted food in the click of a button, whereas the poor district people are barely eating food. This theme is displayed in many things in pop culture. One of the most famous similar pieces of writing that displays this theme is Robin Hood. The story of the man who was a thief who stole from the rich to give to the poor. 

5.      abrueggenjohann[Andrew Brueggenjohann]. “Novel Blog #1.” Padlet, https://padlet.com/abrueggenjohann/dzqv4rwym5e1. Accessed 30 November 2017