Table of Contents
Preface: "If we burn, you burn with us" 1
Poverty, propaganda and protest: why we need to return to Panem.
Introduction: "Real or not real?" 5
It's not a high school drama, it's a political coming-of-age story, for its characters and audience.
Part I The Districts 23
Chapter 1 "District 12, where you can starve to death in safety" 25
Life in the deprived districts induces exhaustion and resignation, but also hidden strengths.
Chapter 2 "They messed us up pretty good, didn't they?" 44
How The Hunger Games resonates with anxious and alienated young people today.
Chapter 3 "Look at the state they left us in" 63
The disasters, the droughts, the storms, the fires…Panem is post-collapse. It's also our future.
Part II The Games 81
Chapter 4 "Welcome to the Capitol" 83
A corrupt elder elite controls society from a shining city; the Capitol already exists in our world.
Chapter 5 "Happy Hunger Games!"
The games the Capitol makes us play are not natural at all.
Chapter 6 "She's a survivor, that one" 120
Can we be more than just a piece in their games?
Part III The Revolution 137
Chapter 7 "Fire is catching" 139
What it takes for the revolution to take flight.
Chapter 8 "Just you remember who the real enemy is" 156
Does the Mockingjay revolution represent the rebirth of society, or something else?
Chapter 9 "No Games, no Capitol" 173
The real revolution that lies hidden at the heart of The Hunger Games.
Epilogue: "Here's some advice. Stay alive" 192
What staying alive really means. "Thank you for your consideration" (author epilogue)
