You don’t decide up a Suzanne Collins novel anticipating a cheerful ending, however Dawn on the Reaping fully and completely shattered me in a manner no different e-book has earlier than. I went in braced for a brutal tragedy—it’s a Starvation Video games prequel, in any case—however what I wasn’t ready for was how profoundly it might transfer me.
Dawn on the Reaping is, for sure, essentially the most superbly tragic e-book I’ve ever learn. Once I completed studying it for the primary time again in March 2025, I spent a few full hour sobbing. I want I had been exaggerating, however that’s how a lot this story damage, and the way deeply it moved me. I actually don’t suppose I’ll ever get well.
I’ve been into The Starvation Video games collection for the reason that first e-book debuted in 2008, and I knew Haymitch needed to have a tragic backstory, so I believed I used to be no less than just a little bit ready for what would unfold on this novel. Boy, was I improper, although. No quantity of preparation may have softened the blow of this story—and but, it’s this very devastation that makes it among the finest books I’ve ever learn.
Dawn on the Reaping tells Haymitch Abernathy’s story, set 24 years earlier than the occasions of the primary The Starvation Video games e-book. Even for those who’re solely frivolously conversant in this collection, you most likely know Haymitch—he’s one of the vital unforgettable characters. After we first meet him within the later collection, he’s drunk, abrasive, sarcastic, and filled with bitterness. However because the collection progresses, we glimpse the damaged man beneath the bravado. We all the time knew he’d been by means of hell, we simply didn’t know the complete extent—till now.
Haymitch’s story begins with on the spot tragedy, as on his sixteenth birthday, he avoids being referred to as within the Reaping, solely to be pressured into the Video games anyway after one of many chosen tributes tries to flee and is killed. Within the aftermath, his girlfriend, Lenore Dove, steps in to consolation the sufferer’s grieving mom. When Haymitch intervenes to guard Lenore from the Peacekeepers, he’s illegally reaped within the place of the fallen tribute.
The model of the video games Haymitch is enjoying is the Quarter Quell, which suggests there are twice as many tributes sentenced to dying within the area, making for 48 kids sentenced to this destiny, and just one who makes it out alive. We all know that survivor is Haymitch, however figuring out the result doesn’t soften the blow. The deaths of the opposite 47 tributes nonetheless land with devastating weight.
My favourite novel from this collection earlier than studying this one was Catching Fireplace, and Dawn on the Reaping is a non secular predecessor to it in each manner. With out giving an excessive amount of away, you study way more about characters from the unique trilogy than you would possibly anticipate, and also you’ll by no means see these books or movies the identical manner once more. The whole lot Haymitch does and says has a complete new which means after studying this, and he’s not the one one.
Just like the tributes in Catching Fireplace, Haymitch finds himself on the coronary heart of a plot to sabotage the sector. This was a twist I didn’t see coming, and one I knew wouldn’t finish properly, seeing because the video games went on for a few years after. Nonetheless, I couldn’t assist however hope issues would by some means end up in a different way than they had been fated to. Even figuring out the way it ends, I discovered myself rooting for Haymitch and the others each step of the best way.
The great thing about this novel is that, yeah, it’s gotta finish badly and that Haymitch goes to expertise some actually traumatizing stuff, however you haven’t any concept the way it all unfolds till you’re deep in it. You realize Haymitch goes to finish up a belligerent drunkard, regardless of his repeated insistence that he doesn’t drink all through this e-book, however you’ll by no means predict what will get him there.
Like each e-book on this collection, Dawn on the Reaping delivers highly effective, well timed messages and political commentary woven seamlessly all through the narrative. It’s additionally acquired some surprisingly enjoyable literary references, just like the recurring use of the poem “The Raven” by Edgar Allen Poe, which is hauntingly tied to each Haymitch and his lover, Lenore Dove.
Simply once you suppose you’ve witnessed the worst this story has to supply, it hits you with one other intestine punch. This cycle continues proper as much as the ultimate pages, the place you’re met with maybe essentially the most devastating blow of all. Should you ever suppose you’re having a nasty day, keep in mind: Haymitch Abernathy is having a far, far worse one.
Should you’ve solely ever learn the primary trilogy, I can’t advocate delving again into the bigger world of The Starvation Video games sufficient. Begin with The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, which gives chilling depth to President Snow’s backstory, then take pleasure in Dawn on the Reaping, a devastating companion that ties all of it collectively in methods you received’t see coming.
I used to be so skeptical of increasing the world of Panem past the primary books, however each of those reads are each bit as highly effective as the unique trilogy, and perhaps even a bit extra haunting. Haymitch’s destiny was sealed lengthy earlier than this e-book started, but Dawn on the Reaping nonetheless makes you’re keen on, damage, and grieve— holding on to hope that issues would possibly end up in a different way, even when the story was all the time meant to interrupt you.
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