I am currently in the middle of Catching Fire, by Suzanne Collins and it is really intense. In the first book The Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark were chosen for the 74th annual Hunger Games. The Hunger Games is a game where the Capital gets 2 tributes from each district and places them in an arena to fight to the death. Miraculously, Peeta and Katniss both win, even though there is usually one winner, because they acted as lovers. Catching Fire takes place in the future where there is a land called Panem and it is split up into the Capital and 12 districts. The Capital controls all of the districts and they are very unfair. Years ago, the districts rebelled against the Capital and they were attacked and bombed by the Capital, and there even used to be a district 13, but that was completely blown off the map. After Katniss and Peeta won the Hunger Games, districts started rebelling because Katniss played a trick on the Capital when both Peeta and her survived. They broke the rules. So, Katniss is the icon for the rebellion. The Peacekeepers take over here life and the Capital makes her marry Peeta. The thing that is even worse is that for the 75th Hunger Games they are doing a "special" twist, the winners are playing again. That means Katniss has to compete in the Hunger Games again, and she goes crazy. Those are just some of the conflicts that Katniss suffers from.
First of all, Katniss deals with the conflict that the Capital rules over here. After she joined the Hunger Games, she never had any privacy from the Capital. She really likes this guy named Gale, but she can't marry or date him because the Capital wants Peeta and Katniss to marry, and she eventually gets engaged to him. She even contemplated to go out and run away in the woods because she wanted to live happily ever after with Gale. One day she went out in the woods and meet some people who were running away from District 8. Katniss was helping them escape, and she was trapped out of her own district because they electrocuted the fence. That made her have to jump from a tree and it almost killed her. She also believes that her house is bugged so that the Capital can spy on her. This conflict of never being left alone in privacy made Katniss more aware and it also made her realize how bad Panem is. It also made her more pessimistic. It made her more aware and alert because now before she ever does anything she makes sure that there is no one spying on her and that she keeps things more secret. The reason why it made Katniss realize how bad Panem is and how it made her more pessimistic is because it gives her a sense that she has no place in privacy and can never be left alone. Everything she does will be watched by the Capital, and she can never break free from the power of the Capital. Also, since she has to go back in the arena, it makes her feel like she is definitely die no matter what, because the odds aren't in her favor anymore.
Second of all, the other issue Katniss faces is that she is the icon for the rebelling even though she doesn't want to be. When she was about to eat the berries to kill her and Peeta, the Capital let both of them survive. That is an act of rebelling and everyone got mad and they saw it as an act of defiance. The pin that Katniss had when she was in the arena became a symbol of her, and that it showed that the people were on her side against the rebellion. The rebellion can kill a lot of people and Katniss will feel guilty. People of the districts that are rebelling are baking the mockingbird that was on Katniss's pin into bread, and people claim to see it over District 13. People believe that District 13 has rebuilt and it is a place of new life. Katniss's face is all over Panem and it is basically Katniss versus the Capital, but Katniss didn't even mean for all of this to happen. She doesn't want the districts to rebel because it will kill a lot of people. From this conflict, Katniss changed to be a person who is more shy and won't tell what they think. Also, it makes Katniss to not be a part of all of this. It makes her want to be in a private place. It makes Katniss a more shy person, and more of a person who doesn't talk that much because it makes her not want to stir up anything else because of what she said. She is scared that she will kill people indirectly because of what she says. She will unintentionally kill these people, and she doesn't mean for all this bad stuff to happen to the people. It also makes her want to be excluded because everywhere she goes, even the woods, everyone is talking about here and what she did to the districts that are rebelling.
In conclusion, Katniss faces a lot of conflicts and it drastically changes who she is. One conflict is that she is the icon for the rebellion against the Capital. The other conflict is that the Capital rules over her. Both of the conflicts change her, but mostly they change her for worse. It makes her more shy and it makes her want to be excluded from the world. The conflicts also make her pessimistic. What the Capital did to Katniss is seriously insane and Katniss deals with really serious conflicts, but overall she deals with them well. I can't wait to read on and see other conflicts she faces.
