Love,Trust,and Sacrifice
“Winning means fame and fortune. Losing means certain death. The Hunger Games have begun....” (Back cover) This quote is from The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. This book portrays love, fighting, and trust. The characters in this book experience that they cannot always trust each other. They also find out that they can’t jump to conclusions about somebody on the way they may act because they might be something unexpected.
In the beginning of the book, Katniss Everdeen is living a somewhat normal life in District Twelve—the poorest district of Panem. There are 12 districts in all of Panem. Katniss is most likely the leader at her household as for the fact that she provides and takes care of her mother and sister. Every year in the districts there is a reaping in which one young man and women are chosen to fight to their death in the annual Hunger Games. This year is Prim’s first year to get chosen, she most likely she won’t get picked. Oddly enough, she does. Katniss knows that Prim can’t stay alive in the arena, so she volunteers as tribute for her sister. Imagine having a family member or even close friend getting chosen to fight to their death against 23 other people. Katniss chose to do this not because she could get to talk to all the fancy interviewers about getting to be in the games, or even the fact that she got to stay a week in the fancy Capitol. She did it to protect her sister, and to protect her family against the horror of losing someone so loved to them.
In addition to getting picked to play in the Hunger Games, Katniss later finds out that Peeta Melllark-the baker’s son-will be playing in the Hunger Games, too. Peeta and Katniss have never really interacted with each other, but she knows that she doesn’t want to watch Peeta get hurt or die in the arena. It’s almost as if someone you didn’t even know was about to die and you felt the urge to save them because you feel a special connection. Katniss of course knows that she can’t get involved with Peeta because of the fact that he might distract her from what really matters, winning and being able to see her family again. Later, she finds a strategy to stay alive. Her strategy is to play a little game of falling in love with Peeta for the crowd and become the star crossed lovers. Haymitch, who is a previous victor of the Hunger Games and Katniss and Peeta’s mentor, thinks the idea is marvelous. They go through with the idea and the plan works. It’s like lying was saving their lives.
As the little act continues, the viewers grow more in love with them. Now, they have to get serious. They have to start training in the arts of survival for the games. While they train they get to know more about each other. Katniss learns that just because Peeta is the bakers son, doesn’t mean he’s living the life. He works a large amount of the day and barely gets to eat decent food. Katniss learns that just because someone looks like everything is good doesn’t mean that they it always is. Also that you really have to get to know someone instead of just guessing at their life story.
As they get closer to the Hunger Games, they begin to start training even harder, they also grow closer. The day of the games is very chaotic. Peeta and Katniss have to say all of their goodbyes, and hope that at least one of them will come back alive. It’s almost like someone dying and having a chance of coming back. When they are in the arena they have a countdown of a minute until they run and get their weapons. Katniss goes off on her own because she figures that the groups the others have formatted will sooner or later attempt to kill each other. You can’t trust anyone in the arena. While Katniss is searching for water, a team of tributes gang up on her to try to kill her. Luckily she climbs up a tree to escape. She comes across a little girl tribute named Rue and they form an alliance. Rue reminds Katniss of her little sister Prim because of how young they both are. When they team up, they form a plan to take out all of the other groups. While the plan is in action Katniss’s worst nightmare happens; Rue dies. Katniss feels that Rue was her one last shot of winning. It was like something had just taken away her last chance to succeed at the games.
While Katniss grieves about her loss of Rue, she also has the urge to stay alive more than before. She sets off to find Peeta. She figures that if she finds Peeta, she will act in love with him to hopefully get sponsors. It’s like when someone uses you to get popular, or to get something that you want. When she finds him he is in need if a medical treatment. She thinks that there is no chance of them winning but then a surprise comes; she gets a medical remedy to fix Peeta’s injury. As nights pass they stay and take cover from all of the others with weapons. They start to fall hopelessly in love with each other knowing that they only have a limited amount of time left. As soon as they know that Cato, another tribute, is the only one left in the arena with them, they go and try to take him down. They almost don’t make it but the capitol sends another little surprise that takes his life away, along with an announcement saying that there can only be one winner. Katniss figures that she doesn’t want to live without Peeta and Peeta feels the same way, although they were never really “in love”. So they both figure that if there both dead then they would have nothing to worry about, but the capitol stops them and crowns them as the victors of the 74th Hunger Games.
The two victors of district 12 come home to interviews, family, and cheering from their whole district. Before everything is over though Peeta encounters the truth about him and Katniss—she was never really in love with him. If you were in a situation where someone just acted through everything you accomplished with them, how would you feel? Never judge someone by their actions because they could very much be something you didn’t expect.
