Sunrise on the Reaping ending explained: How Suzanne Collins expands The Hunger Games universe

However, as with much of Panem’s history, it is both rewritten and enhanced by not believing Capitol propaganda.

As we follow Haymitch’s story through his own eyes, it turns out we didn’t know much about his Games – or his story – at all.

Let’s dig into exactly what we learned about the world of Panem by the end of Sunrise on the Reaping.

*Warning: contains spoilers for Sunrise on the Reaping*

Haymitch’s involvement in the revolution

As with all books in the Hunger Games series, we find out that the Games extend long past when the Victor is announced. In a similar fashion, the revolution to end them - and Panem’s terror – existed long before Katniss Everdeen.

Sunrise on the Reaping's ending sets up the events we see in The Hunger Games trilogy by exploring revolutionary acts – “posters” – before the revolution as we know it existed. The book shows characters we already know and love – Haymitch, Beetee, Wiress, Mags and Plutarch – engaging in the fight that continues during Catching Fire and Mockingjay. We also see Effie just being Effie - bonus!

Plutarch continues this theme in his final conversation with Haymitch, confirming Katniss Everdeen was not a chosen one, but somebody “exactly like him” just with a bit more luck and the right circumstances. The parallels between Haymitch and Katniss have never been clearer than in Sunrise.

We find out that Haymitch was far more actively revolutionary than we were led to believe and this, plus Haymitch's heartbreaking deathbed promise to Lenore, adds to his role in the forthcoming rebellion, as does his former friendship with Katniss' parents.

Sunrise itself continues to play on this theme of revolution being built by multiple generations through songs and poems, with everyone’s newest favourite character, Maysilee, quoting “Nothing You Can Take From Me”, while Burdock Everdeen sings “The Old Therebefore”, both songs Lucy Gray also sings; Haymitch discusses “The Hanging Tree” which ends up being incredibly important to both The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes as well as Katniss Everdeen’s revolution cry for Panem. “Pure As the Driven Snow,” the romantic ballad Lucy Gray writes about her and Snow’s romance, is notably absent from Sunrise, and is a song Katniss never speaks of.

Lucy Gray and Lenore Dove’s parents

Haunting the narrative – and Snow – as usual, Lucy Gray Baird is an important character in The Hunger Games series since winning the 10th Games. While Sunrise is set 40 years after her story, in the negative space where she should be, we learn a lot about the Covey, District 12, Haymitch and…Katniss, too. Yes, long-time fan theories have held up, Katniss seems to be descended from the Covey. More on that later.

We get a non-answer to her whereabouts in the ending, and it’s entangled up in the identity of Haymitch’s girl – Lenore Dove, named after the Edgar Allan Poe poem. Perhaps you jumped to the conclusion that she was the daughter of Lucy Gray and Snow, as the book suggests the father is absent? While Collins leaves the identity of both parents ambiguous, the timing would mean that Snow and Lucy Gray would’ve had to rekindle their romance as adults with a secret love child. We agree, it doesn’t sound likely. However, at the end of the book, we see Maude Ivory’s grave as Haymitch mourns Lenore Dove. We can conclude then that Lenore Dove is the child of Maude Ivory instead, as we know her mother died in childbirth.

Speaking of graves, seeing Lucy Gray’s was a gut-punch. But just like Lucy Gray the poem, her whereabouts are still up in the air at the end of Sunrise, despite what's implied. This is one question we will never get an answer to. If you want to believe the canon saying she returned to District 12 under a pseudonym, that’s open to you, but it seems most likely that Lucy Gray only has a grave dedicated for the Covey to mourn and is not any indication that a body returned to 12. We suspect if that had happened, Snow might be less…obsessed. If Lucy Gray did escape, perhaps this is why Lenore Dove dreamed of running North and finding people outside of Panem. Birds yearn to fly free, after all.

Katniss and her connection to the Covey

There were a lot of questions post Ballad about the Covey as there’s no mention of them in Katniss’ original story. The nomadic musical family were confined to District 12 following the first rebellion and lots of theories centre on Katniss being descended from them. It makes a lot of sense as Katniss has an affinity for music and, as well as knowing Covey songs, can memorise music swiftly – Covey songs also haunt the original trilogy.

We find out the name of her father, Burdock Everdeen, and her mother, Astrid March, shockingly early on, as well as links to the Covey and Haymitch via Burdock Everdeen (Burdock refers to Lenore Dove as “cuz”, and Haymitch confirms they aren’t direct cousins but distant ones) but it is not until right at the end of the book that we can piece together how Sunrise on the Reaping confirms these ties.

It’s still a little ambiguous, perhaps on purpose, but if we assume Lucy Gray is not in the picture – a forever-mystery as she must be – that leaves only Maude Ivory and Barb Azure as possibly contenders for Katniss and Primrose Everdeen’s ancestors. If Maude Ivory is Lenore Dove’s mother, then Barb Azure is the ancestor linked to the Everdeen’s, but we’ll leave it up to you to decide.

There are more connections, too. Remember the flint striker that composes the cover of Sunrise? Tam Amber made it, and it also happens that he made the Mockingjay pin for Maysilee Donner that eventually gets passed down to Katniss. An appropriate metaphor, as the Capitol has such an abundance of lighters that they fail to see the flint striker’s potential as a weapon.

Haymitch’s tragic fate

Readers know what's coming when Haymitch returns to District 12: the deaths of his mother, brother, and girlfriend are something we can’t avoid. From his reaping being literally rigged to our collective sigh of sadness at Haymitch “I don’t drink” Abernathy’s introduction, the tragedy was set in stone from the beginning, so we can only watch helplessly as it unfolds.

An uncanniness creeps in throughout the novel that culminates in these inevitable deaths. Some examples: Collins employs a Latin poetry trope, locus amoenus, where a pleasant place has an underlying threat, Lucy Gray’s performance being played when Haymitch is in confinement, the intense amount of doppelganger’s – Haymitch’s sisters, the Donners, Louella and Lou Lou (his first sweetheart)...the list goes on. It’s not only interesting metaphorically, but the tragedy all leads to the moment his mother and brother die in a fire upon his return to District 12 with not enough water in the cistern to save them and the gumdrops that kill Lenore Dove, breaking Haymitch’s heart in two. President Snow leaves her a bag of poisoned gumdrops, mirroring the candies that Haymitch regularly gifts her, as well as Katniss and Peeta’s berries. Haymitch feeds two of them to her before realising his mistake, even after worrying himself about poisoned food earlier in the novel. It hurt, and it was meant to.

The Geese

Sunrise explores themes of implicit submission, media literacy and propaganda, and it’s heavily implied in the epilogue that Haymitch has eventually told Katniss and Peeta, his new family, the truth about how his games were manipulated and the cost of his revolution, as Katniss and Peeta help him to start raising geese, Lenore Dove’s animal. The Capitol cut every act of defiance and unity in their taping of his Games – which is interesting to think about in context of the first Hunger Games book and story – so he would have had to tell them the truth at least about Lenore Dove for them to know what raising geese could heal in him. Yes, we cried, too.

Ultimately, Sunrise has added lots of interesting knowledge about the world of Panem and the characters we know and love, as well as a glaringly poignant look at our modern world, but…there’s always more questions Suzanne Collins could choose to answer. For example, what happened to Beetee’s other child..and was the Capitol woman Maysilee brutally mocks with real cat ears sewn into her head Tigris? Like Lucy Gray’s poem, perhaps not everything always needs an answer.

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