The Hunger Games, a franchise beloved by many for decades, gained its fifth addition on March 18, 2025 with the release of Sunrise on the Reaping. Following a ten year absence, Suzanne Collins released the first prequel to the original series, The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, on May 19, 2020, launching the seemingly brief return of the series. Just like their predecessors, Sunrise on the Reaping and The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes continued the series’s political commentary, with Collins urging her readers to see the parallels between her fictional world of Panem and the real world’s issues.

Sunrise on the Reaping focuses on the original trilogy’s alcoholic mentor, Haymitch Abernathy, and how his games shaped him. Although there is a snapshot of Haymitch’s games in the series’s second book, Catching Fire, it is only an abridged televised version that was shown to the Capitol. Collins uses this unreliable source to provide commentary on misinformation and controlling the narrative, turning the reader into a product of propaganda that is only realized over a decade after the release of Catching Fire. This proves to the reader that not even they are immune to propaganda, a concept that runs contrary to many people’s belief in themselves to see through lies. Much like The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, Sunrise on the Reaping focuses only a small portion of the book on the games themselves, instead turning much of the narrative’s focus onto the political clashes set up by the previous four books. 

The novel opens with an introduction to Haymitch’s relationship with his family and friends, with a heavy emphasis on his younger brother, single mother, and girlfriend. Despite the looming knowledge of their ultimate demise, Collins still takes the time and effort to establish a connection between the well-known Haymitch and his previously unnamed loved ones. These loved ones and his need to protect them is what drives many of his decisions, especially his actions pertaining to Louella McCoy, who perished during a chariot parade accident. Haymitch lays her dead body in front of President Coriolanus Snow, intending to make it known to both him and the entirety of Panem that Snow is directly responsible for Louella’s death by continuing to uphold the Hunger Games.

Despite only directly encountering Snow a handful of times throughout the book, the President of Panem casts a shadow on the book that suffocates both the reader and Haymitch. It is Snow’s little actions throughout the book, some of which are never confirmed to actually be the result of his doing, that slowly unwind both the truth of the Second Quarter Quell and Haymitch’s mental state. Ultimately, it is the death of his family and girlfriend, both of which were orchestrated by President Snow, that turns Haymitch into the character seen in The Hunger Games. 

While Sunrise on the Reaping is incredibly well-written, some parts of it felt like they existed only to cater to fans. One of these parts was the number of familiar names, especially in the first few chapters, many of which never appeared again or had no impact on the narrative. The existence or mention of names like Tan Amber, Lucy Gray Baird, Maude Ivory, and Katniss’s father, Burdock Everdeen, while nice to see, felt cheap to an extent. More significant character reappearances, like Effie Trinket and Plutarch Heavensbee, played a much larger role in Haymitch’s story, making their appearances feel earned and, at times, even added more to their characters.

Although some parts of the book felt like they only existed for the fans instead of the narrative, Collins still managed to craft an incredible story that didn’t feel like it was stretching the marketability of The Hunger Games series. One of the most difficult aspects of being an author is knowing when to let your story rest, as it is often tempting to continue expanding the world until either there is nothing left to explore or the fans leave it behind. Collins does not appear to have this issue yet, as Sunrise on the Reaping feels just as impactful and important to the story as the original trilogy did. It would be extremely easy for her to tell the same story over and over again with each new addition to the series, and people would no doubt still read it, but instead she chooses to bring a fresh perspective to each book and touch on different aspects of Panem’s dystopian society. 

With every praise and criticism taken into consideration, my personal rating for Sunrise on the Reaping is a 4.5/5.