Suzanne Collins

It is the morning of the reaping that will kick off the tenth annual Hunger Games. In the Capital, eighteen-year-old Coriolanus Snow is preparing for his one shot at glory as a mentor in the Games. The once-mighty house of Snow has fallen on hard times, its fate hanging on the slender chance that Coriolanus will be able to outcharm, outwit, and outmaneuver his fellow students to mentor the winning tribute.

The odds are against him. He's been given the humiliating assignment of mentoring the female tribute from District 12, the lowest of the low. Their fates are now completely intertwined -- every choice Coriolanus makes could lead to favor or failure, triumph or ruin. Inside the arena, it will be a fight to the death. Outside the arena, Coriolanus starts to feel for his doomed tribute... and must weigh his need to follow the rules against his desire to survive no matter what it takes.

The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes

Selina 

“Before we talk about making people watch, shouldn’t we begin with the question of whether or not watching is the right thing to do?”

If it came to a mentor-tribute showdown, the odds were not in Coriolanus’ favour.

“No, it isn’t! I don’t care what you say. You’ve got no right to starve people, to punish them for no reason. No right to take away their life and freedom. Those are things everyone is born with, and they’re not yours for the taking. Winning a war doesn’t give you that right. Having more weapons doesn’t give you that right. Being from the Capitol doesn’t give you that right. Nothing does. Oh, I don’t even know why I came here today.”

Someone she referred to as “lover”, no less. And while he had no claim on her heart - he barely knew the girl! - he didn’t like the idea of anyone else having it either.

Poor Coriolanus, he must be in such pain at letting Lucy Gray go.

Suddenly, he felt a surge of anger. What good were any of these unless she could use them to defend herself? What was he doing but dressing her up to be a pretty corpse?

This hurts. It shows you the different mindsets.

“Tell her,” said Tigris, “that I am rooting for her.”

“Tell her,” the Grandma’am added, “that we are all so sorry she has to die.”

“I don’t want to die,” she whispered.

A terrible pain clutched his chest as a toxic wave of homesickness and despair swamped him. He felt sure he was having a heart attack but made no attempt to call for help, instead curling into a ball and pressing his face against the wall. Perhaps it was for the best. Because there was no out. Nowhere to run. No hope of rescue. No future that was not a living death. What did he have to look forward to? Hash? A weekly cup of gin? A promotion from dish washing to dish scraping? Wasn’t it better to die now, quickly, than to drag it out painfully for years?

Love this song. The backstory to it is so interesting as well. 

Where they strung up a man they say murdered three?

If we met up at midnight, in the hanging tree. 

Where the dead man called out for his love to flee?

If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree.

“The odds didn’t seem in my favour”

The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes quotes

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