I'm nervous about the new Haymitch book...

What is it with all of these prequels? First Gollum and Elle Woods, now Haymitch?

I want to start out this lil rant by saying that I LOVE The Hunger Games books.

Suzanne Collins is an absolute genius. I first read the original trilogy when I was in middle school, and it has stuck with me ever since. Furthermore, I always admired how she hadn’t written books beyond THG just for the money. She just wrote the most influential YA dystopian trilogy ever, sparking a decade of copycats, and… disappeared.

A few years later, Collins surprised the world (me included, definitely me included) with The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, AKA the President Snow origin story. I avoided the book for a while, not imagining what those pages could possibly contain that I would actually want to read, but when I did crack and read it, I could not put it down. I’d even go as far as to say it’s neck-and-neck with Catching Fire. It’s that good. Last November, I arrived at the movie theater to see my first Panem movie on the big screen.

To an extent, I think we were all more or less expecting another trip to Panem after the success of Ballad, but this soon? NOPE. And with this character? DOUBLE NOPE. And with a movie already announced? TRIPLE NOPE.

Just this morning, I got frantic texts from my bookish friends, announcing Sunrise on the Reaping (great title, by the way), Haymitch Abernathy’s Hunger Games, and I thought it was a joke. Yes, I am still sort of in shock about it all. I think that’s partially why I’m not jumping-for-joy excited, but there’s more to it as well.

This isn’t to say that I dislike Haymitch or think he’s a terrible character. Haymitch is an amazingly complex mentor character. I just think this news is… weird? Anyone else think so? To me, this is at the same level as a book about Minerva McGonagall, or Doc Brown, or Gandalf - yeah, it would be cool to read, but in a million years, I never would have predicted it existing.

And yeah, I’m nervous.

The thing about Haymitch is that his story is DARK. And when I say dark, I mean PITCH-BLACK. There’s a reason he’s a miserable drunk when we first meet him in The Hunger Games. One of my friends wondered if the accompanying movie could earn an R-rating due to the violence of the Second Quarter Quell.

Forty-nine tributes - forty-nine children! - will die in that book.

Let that sink in.

There are a lot of elements of Haymitch’s Games that are arguably worse than Katniss and Peeta’s Games, and, without spoiling too much, there will be no happy ending for this story. He will be drunk and alone as the credits roll. Haymitch’s happy ending (if you can even call it that) doesn’t come until after President Snow is taken down and the Games are destroyed… twenty-five years after his story takes place. That’s a lot of time to be drunk and alone.

From a writer’s standpoint, it’s a weird character to write a story about because ultimately, the hero will follow a negative character arc, but he won’t become a villain. He just becomes… lesser than he was. Sort of like if Anakin Skywalker quit being a Jedi, but instead of becoming Darth Vader, he just ditched The Force and started drinking to forget all the time. This sort of ending isn’t satisfying to readers. We want a complete arc, and for a Haymitch novel, that just won’t happen.

The chapter in Catching Fire about Haymitch’s Games is one of the best in the series because of how succinctly and perfectly it explains him. It sort of reminds me of the chapter “The Prince’s Tale” in Harry Potter in the Deathly Hallows. We’ve spent several books seeing Snape as a mean old grouch, and after that one chapter, we understand why. That being said, we don’t need a Snape movie because J.K. Rowling already told us everything we needed to know about him.

Looking at this upcoming novel in that same light, we don’t really NEED Sunrise on the Reaping. It’s not like Ballad, where we really had no idea how President Snow turned evil. After that chapter, we as readers know exactly why Haymitch is the way he is.

I really want to be excited for this. I do trust Suzanne Collins, and I don’t believe she’d write this story solely as a cash-grab. And in some ways, I am really excited for this.

But to be honest? I’m a little scared to be inside Haymitch’s head.

I’m always apprehensive about other Panem stories centered around Games. My friends have rambled on and on about a Haymitch Games, a Mags Games, or a Finnick Games, but I’m really hesitant about any of that. I’m not sure I’d want to read about them. Suzanne Collins has alluded to the horrors that these Victors faced both in and out of the arena, horrors that Katniss and Peeta luckily escaped due to the uprising. The more I think about it, the more I’m convinced that I would NEVER want to read a novel entirely about Finnick Odair.

I had a creative writing teacher in high school who taught us that stories start on the day something changes. All of those stories within the Games are only a continuity of a horrible situation. The CHANGE happens during Katniss and Peeta’s story when they inspire a revolution.

Only time will tell how Sunrise on the Reaping will play out. For now, I remain cautiously optimistic about this new venture into Panem.

What do you think? Thoughts on Sunrise on the Reaping?