Sunrise on the Reaping: Book Review [The Hunger Games 0.5]

Hello, dearies! 📚

It’s been a while since I read a book so fast, and fresh out of the oven. But here we are.

It was easy reading Sunrise on the Reaping, and going back to the Capitol, Panem, District 12, even when it was not shown all that much, and discovering how they wanted everything to fit and explain The Hunger Games and the plots that unraveled there.

That’s pretty much it. The end. 😅 Just kidding, sort of.

Let me show you what this book was like, considering that we wanted to know what happened to Haymitch Abernathy, and we sure did. 🫠

And yes, there will be spoilers all over this post, like I will assume you want to know or you have finished reading the book, too.

Author: Suzanne Collins

Book Title: Sunrise on the Reaping

Book Series: The Hunger Games Series 0.5

Who? Haymitch Abernathy

Hunger Games? The 50th Hunger Games [Second Quarter Quell]

Genres: Dystopia. Young Adult. Explanations. Singing. History of Panem. Drama.

Year: 2025

Page Count: 382 pages, Hardcover

Thoughts while Reading the Book

A.k.a my notes on different phrases and chapters.

Also, quotes from Sunrise on the Reaping.

“The second Quarter Quell. Twice as many kids. No point in worrying, I tell myself, there’s nothing you can do about it. Like two Hunger Games in one. No way to control the outcome of the reaping or what follows it. So don’t feed the nightmares. Don’t let yourself panic. Don’t give the Capitol that. They’ve taken enough already.”

• “Burdock’s Everdeen cousins,” I knew he was ‘Everdeen’. why? because he was singing.
• “blood kin, her being a Baird…” seriously? like Lucy Gray Baird? 🤨
• “Because the reaping’s going to happen no matter what I believe. Sure as the sun will rise tomorrow.”
• “I turn it over in my hand, then grip the C again, this time covering the animal heads with my fingers. Then I see its purpose. The smooth steel edge isn’t solely decorative. “It’s a flint striker,” I conclude. “It sure is!”
• ““It takes a lot to break these two. They’re survivors.”“I love it.” I give her a long, soft kiss. “And I love you like all-fire.”” Me: Crying in silence, because it will be horrible.
• “Hanging behind the temporary stage in front of the Justice Building is a huge banner of President Snow’s face with the words PANEM’S #1 PEACEKEEPER.” Me: 🤣🤣
• “white liquor.” Wow, it suddenly struck me, he made it but didn’t drink, yet!!! YET!
• “I’m a tribute in the Hunger Games. In a few days, I’ll die in the arena.” All of this, because of a girl? Because another one ran off and then Haymitch wanted to save this Lenore girl who is going to die anyway. 🫠
• “She isn’t crying, so Plutarch won’t get his tearful good-bye. Not from her and not from me. They will not use our tears for their entertainment.” Ch. 2 and already we were holding back tears.
• “The moment our hearts shattered? It belongs to us.” But the pain and the drama.
• Drusilla’s expression twists into a leer. “I hope you do win. You have no idea what’s in store for you then. You know nothing.” They don’t, do they? There’s never been a winner since Lucy, and back then the tributes were thrown in the arena like animals, but now they have more cameras and propaganda, so I guess this makes sense.
• “…about breaking into the Donners’ and stealing that mockingjay pin back.” And maybe she did. And then, me five seconds later: Wait, what? I was so into the story I didn’t realise what this meant. Katniss’ pin.
• ‘“Doing all right, sweetheart?” I ask.’ Is it that Katniss reminds him of this girl? Or he started calling everyone sweetheart after that?
• ‘TRIBUTE CENTER’ Things changed a lot in 25 years, by Katniss time it was a great building.
• Soft footfalls approach and a small young woman appears. I recognize her immediately. The black-haired girl from District 3 who won last year’s Hunger Games. “Hello, I’m Wiress. One of your mentors.”
• ‘And while Lenore Dove will forever be my true love, Louella is my one and only sweetheart.’ Until Katniss.
• ‘While he bears a strong resemblance to Ampert, this is not why he looks familiar. It’s Beetee, a victor from District 3. A cold dread washes over me as the puzzle pieces come together. Ampert is neither a lunatic nor a liar. His father has accompanied him to the Capitol because he’s a victor. And therefore a mentor, assigned to coach his own child to his death in the Fiftieth Hunger Games.’ I thought of it, but didn’t think it would be true. how old is Beetee seriously.

32 or so in case anyone was wondering, he was reaped on the day Haymitch was born, if that is what Beetee meant later on.

This seems like a good moment to stop and take a break from the quotes and notes, no?

Alright, let’s keep going.

• ‘It’s like they’ve tried to bring the whole outdoors indoors. Why? Is opening a door and walking through it too much trouble? Fools and their money are soon parted, Ma would say.’ Me:🤣
• ‘Evil in the flesh.’ On Snow.
• ‘Was my crime really so great that it requires a personal meeting?’ Yes, Haymitch.
• ‘I’m left alone with a retching Snow. It’s scary watching him possibly die. It’s even scarier that I can resist helping him. Before the reaping, I bet I would have been right in there. Louella’s death changed me. Maybe I’ll end up being victor material after all.’ What the f? This was like, huh? Ok.
• ‘Wyatt falls asleep and starts up the chain saw.’ 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣. I don’t know, it was just funny while reading this chapter.
• ‘A guy who’s only out for himself. This is the one way I might be able to sell myself to the Gamemakers without rousing suspicions about my greater ambitions.’ All the way to Katniss and Peeta time.
• ‘You stay alive, play your songs, love your people, live the best life you can. And I’ll be there in the Meadow waiting for you. It’s a promise. Okay?”’ Great, now I’m singing the song on repeat in my head. you know the one: deep in the meadow, over the … 🎵🎵
• “Nevermore” 🤣 I’m laughing because it’s just too much, but seriously? What’s with The Raven?
• ‘She’s already drugged and brainwashed — I don’t need her sick as well.’ I would be the worst ally, but sorry, girl. you’ll be dying soon so only a bit of food and water for you. I mean come on, what’s the point?
• ‘Fire is catching,’ 😸🤦‍♀️ you gotta stop with the puns.
• ‘Why do they flock to me?’ Because you are a big brother.
• ‘A small white skeleton, stripped clean to the bone.’ Oh my god. 😳
• ‘I keep the fire burning with bits of fuel until the sun rises on our fifth day in the arena.’
• ‘A patch of katniss…’ For the love of God, Suzanne! 🤣😸🤦‍♀️Enough with the references.
• ‘“You came back to me. In this world!”“And you managed not to get hung!” I crow back.’ It’s going to be horrible… 🥹 I’m almost scared of the horrific death.
• ‘’Tis the wind and nothing more!”‘ Enough, we got it with the song, poem, whatever.

Wow, that took some time, I knew I had highlighted some things, but I might have got carried away. And then it was over, and I was left staring at the screen of my phone, thinking on whether I truly liked it or not.

Sunrise on the Reaping: Review

On why and how Haymitch became the town’s drunk and outcast.

Not solely for winning the Games but because everyone he loved was killed as soon as the games were over.

If you think a little about it, Snow was a lot softer on THG. Because he could have killed Peeta or his parents, and Katniss’ mother as soon as she returned to 12.

But back to Haymitch (I have to read Catching Fire Ch 14 again).

So, by the end, the epilogue and last chapter it was all truly coming full circle on why he was how he was, but unlike TBOSAS and with Coryo, which was filled with excuses, this felt like what could have happened with just a tiny dose of far-fetch, but you knew how Haymitch cared for Peeta and Katniss, and how he sobered up enough on THG to answer, and mentor Peeta. And then Katniss, and the advice he gave them was the ones that Mags and Wiress gave him when they mentored him, which was shocking to see.

You’ll think Wiress was younger than him or the same age by THG, and Beetee even more, to have a teenage kid, but they were older than Haymitch.

And, #sorrynotsorry but Lenore Dove was so irrelevant to me other than she was his girlfriend and a Covey girl. The Covey doesn’t mean that much in The Hunger Games, so it has been difficult to me to connect with it.

It has been a thing since TBOSAS with Lucy.

Also, what did Snow do? Have them all killed one by one until they were no more? Because Katniss’ singing came from her dad, not even a Covey descendant. (Again, they were never mentioned before.) Which only makes me think they are so made-up and an excuse for the songs from 12. What gave Snow a reason to hate on 12 even more.

Now, The Raven, the poem, the repetition. That last chapter was painful to me. I only wanted to see how Haymitch got on being alone, and all there was, was the poem, over and over 😑. Was this the only way of making a point of his pain? I feel like there could be a better option for it, and still allow for us to feel that pain that he was feeling because everyone was gone and he alienated himself.

But the epilogue was a nice touch, would have been nicer to see more of it. You cannot throw bits of Katniss and Peeta like that at us and then expect us to be content when the end comes up.

So, 4~5/5 ⭐ stars. I cannot decide but I’m inclined to make it 4 since I cannot say 4.5 on most platforms but here.

More thoughts

Imagine this, you have a perfect outline of what a character arc is, but you have to explain why the heck this character is how he is 20 years after his turn in the arena ended, what do you do? Make up excuses for him? Or try to explain your way up to the point where he grabbed a bottle and never let it go? It seems both are the same but it is not quite to that extent, and so, why was Haymitch miserable, alone, and with no visible family to take care of him? Well, that’s Sunrise on the Reaping, that is exactly what you get with this book.

As a plus, you get all the bits and pieces of why, how, where, or when this side alliances with other districts started, how come he was able to talk people into sponsoring Katniss, or how come he there with the resistance when they took Katniss from the arena at the end of Catching Fire.

Hello, spoilers, yes, I warned you about those.

In any case, that is how it went down for Haymitch, and how we found out the poor guy was devastated and alone forever.

But I suppose you have to give it to Suzanne Collins for delivering exactly what the readers were expecting for years, would she go back now to Mags or jump to Finnick Odair? If she is going to do Finnich, sorry, but it has to be his reaping plus the time that came after and all the ‘favours’ he did for people in the capitol. If you going to be darker, you have to go all the way, like by the end of this one, it had turned even more into the terrain of what we see the Capitol do and say on The Hunger Games.

I have taken a sideways road, I know. Back to Sunrise on the Reaping. Expect this one to make an appearance on my podcast this year, I have to talk more about it. But for now, I think I have said my piece, and while I consumed the book as quickly as it arrived in my hands, I still felt a bit, wow, that’s it, is over? That doesn’t mean I didn’t like it or enjoyed it because I sure did. More than The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, that’s for sure, and I could see everything so freaking clearly about how the movie should be is amazing. And half the time I was signing the hymn (Anthem) of Panem it was annoying. 😂

I cannot wait for the movie to come out, which would be in 2026.

I am truly done now, dearies! Thank you for coming and experiencing Sunrise on the Reaping with me, this post might have some re-edits this week, but in essence this was it, this is the raw version of how I read the book and then came to talk about it, is all fresh.

Thank you for sticking to the end, it’s been some time since I posted a long book review like this one, but do let me know if you have read the book or are still reading it, in which case, I hope there were not many spoilers for you.

That’s all, and may the odds be EVER in your favor! 🕊️

Update April

Did you watch it? Did you know? The teaser for Sunrise on the Reaping Movie is out now:

TL;DR: Sunrise on the Reaping

Warning, there are spoilers here:

So this book is essentially how Haymitch became the district’s drunk, not just because he won the Games, but because everyone (almost) he loved was killed after. Unlike The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, it doesn’t feel like excuses, it feels like truth, just a touch far-fetched in some chapters. You see why he cared for Peeta and Katniss, how he sobered up just enough to help them, and how the advice he gave were from Mags and Wiress (which was awesome to read).

Lenore Dove? A bit on the forced points, sorry. And the Covey? Still like meh for me. The repetition of The Raven in the final chapter? Painful, yes, but there could’ve been better ways to show Haymitch’s grief. All in all, 4~5⭐️ for me. I read it as soon as it landed in my hands and couldn’t put it down. It’s raw, heavy, and exactly what we’ve wanted for years. Can’t wait to talk more about it on the podcast soon. So, don’t miss out on that.

Update August 2025:

Want to hear me ranting about books? About this book? Check out my Book Chat: EachPage Flow Season 3 Ep. 1.