2025 & 2026 Reading Challenge discussion

This thread is to discuss Catching Fire, the second book in the Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins.

Pages: 391 pages

Length: 1 month (September)

Participants: Cordelia, Dominique, LinaVer

Everyone reads at their own pace during a Buddy Read. Because participants can be at different parts of the book at different times, it is extremely important to mark spoilers so that the book is not ruined for someone who is not as far along as others!!!

Mark spoilers by placing {spoiler} before the text and {/spoiler} after the text but use the < and > instead of the { and }.

Here are some questions to help get the conversation started! Feel free to look up discussion questions specific to this book or come up with your own. Just make sure any questions that contain spoilers are under spoiler tags.
Discussion questions are not required but may be a fun way to talk about the book and get to know each other!

Prior to starting:
What prompted you to join this buddy read?
Have you read this author before? What do you think of their other books?

Mid-read:
What character or ideas do you relate to the most and why?
Do you have any favorite quotes or scenes?

After reading:
What was enjoyable or not-so-enjoyable about this book?
Did this book change your perception about anything, either within the book (character development) or in real life?

Hey buddies! I've already started this one as soon as I finished The Hunger Games because I really wanted to stay with Katniss in her world for a bit longer.
I am reading it slowly though, as I have other books in progress and/or planned I have to finish first.

Let me know how it is going for you and if you're enjoying reading it so far!

My thoughts while reading

(view spoiler)[
• p. 42: "Over the course of the last five years, the lake's remarkably unchanged and I'm almost unrecognizable." -- This touched me so much. She is reminiscing about how she used to go to the lake with her father, and how now, after 5 years and her father's death, and all the other terrible things she's had to go through, that changed her completely, but the lake's unchanged. Made me think and feel a certain way about how life can alter us in unrecognizable ways - even to ourselves.
• p. 75: "But I feel as if I did know Rue, and she'll always be with me. Everything beautiful brings her to mind. I see her in the yellow flowers that grow in the Meadow by my house. I see her in the mockingjays that sing in the trees. But most of all, I see her in my sister, Prim." -- This scene in District 11 reduced me to tears again. You know how some people react very strongly to the death of Dobby in HP, well, I don't know what it is, but to me it's always Rue.
• I’m in part 2 now. I really liked the moment when Peeta and Katniss are filling in that sketchbook about herbs and edible plants - having a moment of normalcy and reprieve amidst all the tension and suffering. It felt like a chance for her to develop or at least recognise (a bit better than before) her feelings for Peeta as well. Just some normal life stuff, that both of them so deserve. Even if it is short and fleeting.
•


(hide spoiler)]

I've finished Catching Fire. Loved it. Watched the movie (a re-watch for me) the same evening after finishing the book as well. I like the book better than the movie, even though the movie series I also find good.

Somehow I never thought about the fact that when Haymitch (view spoiler)[arranged Katniss to be saved from the 75th Games arena, in order to use her as "mockingjay", as an inspiration for the rebellion, without asking if she wants to be a symbol for the uprising, without even telling her, well, he was kind of using her as a game piece. It is a different game, sort of with a "better" goal, but still a game. And so when Katniss thinks about that, about her not having any agency and him deceiving her, it kind of broke my heart for her. (hide spoiler)]

Will be interesting to read other people's thoughts, if anyone else is still participating in this buddy read, haha.

I can't wait to read the last book in this original trilogy.

Finished. That was really good. So much better than the movie. Fills in all the gaps and explains so much more. Loved It.