Suzanne Collins Quotes & Sayings

From a place of protection to a sinister trap. I know at some point we'll be forced to reenter its depths, either to hunt or be hunted, but for right now I'm planning to stick — Suzanne Collins

Katniss, it's just hunting. You're the best hunter I know." Gale

"It's not just hunting. They're armed, they think." --Katniss

"So do you. And you've had more practice. Real practice. You know how to kill." --Gale

"Not people." --Katniss

"How different can it be, really?" --Gale

The awful thing is that if I can forget they're people, it will be no different at all. --Katniss — Suzanne Collins

Desperate, yet no longer alone after that day, because we'd found each other. — Suzanne Collins

I know every arrow must count, and they do. In the eerie light, — Suzanne Collins

Time and tragedy have forced her to grow too quickly, at least for my taste, into a young woman who stitches bleeding wounds and knows our mother can hear only so much. — Suzanne Collins

...adding to the miseries competing for my attention... — Suzanne Collins

I don't want anyone with me today. Not even him. Some walks you have to take alone. — Suzanne Collins

He tells the hiustory of Panem, the country that rose up out of the ashes of a place that was once North America. — Suzanne Collins

While I was waiting...I ate your lunch. — Suzanne Collins

Peeta, how come I never know when you're having a nightmare?" I say.
"I don't know. I don't think I cry out or thrash around or anything. I just come to, paralyzed with terror," he says.
"You should wake me," I say, thinking about how I can interrupt his sleep two or three times on a bad night. About how long it can take to calm me down.
"It's not necessary. My nightmares are usually about losing you," he says. "I'm okay once I realize you're here. — Suzanne Collins

If your parent is deployed and you are that young, you spend the whole time wondering where they are and waiting for them to come home. As time passes and the absence is longer and longer, you become more and more concerned - but you don't really have the words to express your concern. There's only this continued absence. — Suzanne Collins

Think that; I know I should be grateful for the way we have been welcomed. Sick, wounded, starving, and empty-handed. Still, I can never get around the fact that District 13 was — Suzanne Collins

I can hear President Snow's voice in my head. 'On the seventy-fifth anniversary, as a reminder to the rebels that even the strongest among them cannot overcome the power of the capital, the male and female tributes will be reaped from their existing pool of victors. — Suzanne Collins

The main thing I feel is a sense of relief. That I can give up this game. That the question of whether I can succeed in this venture has been answered, even if that answer is a resounding no. That if desperate times call for desperate measures, I am free to act as desperately as I want. — Suzanne Collins

You know what my mother said to me when she came to say good-bye, as if to cheer me up, she says maybe District Twelve will finally have a winner. Then I realized she didn't mean me, she meant you!" bursts out Peeta.
"Oh, she meant you," I say with a wave of dismissal.
"She said, 'She's a survivor, that one.' She is," says Peeta.
That pulls me up short. Did his mother really say that about me? Did she rate me over her son? I see the pain in Peeta's eyes and know he isn't lying.
Suddenly I'm behind the bakery and I can feel the chill of the rain running down my back, the hollowness in my belly. I sound eleven years old when I speak. "But only because someone helped me. — Suzanne Collins

What will break me into a million pieces so that I am beyond repair, beyond usefulness? — Suzanne Collins

You could live a hundred lifetimes and not deserve him, you know, Haymitch — Suzanne Collins

All I want to do is collapse on my metal plate. — Suzanne Collins

You're punishing him over and over for things that are out of his control. Now, I'm not saying you shouldn't have a fully loaded weapon next to you round the clock. But I think it's time you flipped this little scenario in your head. If you'd been taken by the Capitol, and hijacked, and then tried to kill Peeta, is this the way he would be treating you? demands Haymitch.
I fall silent. It isn't. It isn't how he would be treating me at all. He would be trying to get me back at any cost. Not shutting me out, abandoning me, greeting me with hostility at every turn. — Suzanne Collins

It's time for the drawing. Effie Trinket says as she always does, "Ladies first!" and crosses to the glass ball with the girls' names. She reaches in, digs her hand deep into the ball, and pulls out a slip of paper. The crowd draws in a collective breath and then you can hear a pin drop, and I'm feeling nauseous and so desperately hoping that it's not me, that it's not me, that it's not me. — Suzanne Collins

She's a survivor, that one. — Suzanne Collins

I don't write about adolescence. I write about war. For adolescents. — Suzanne Collins

Johanna Mason is naked again and oiling her skin down for a wrestling lesson. — Suzanne Collins

She zips back to the podium, and I don't even have time to wish for Gale's safety when she's reading the name. "Peeta Mellark."
Peeta Mellark!
Oh, no, I think. Not him. Because I recognize this name, although I have never spoken directly to its owner. Peeta Mellark.
No, the odds are not in my favor today. — Suzanne Collins

Numerous animals have lost their lives at my hands, but only one human. I hear Gale saying, How different can it be, really? — Suzanne Collins

Well, you better learn fast. You've got about as much charm as a dead slug," says Haymitch. — Suzanne Collins

She genuinely likes people. All people, not just a select few she's spent years making up her mind about. — Suzanne Collins

I just...I just miss him. And I hate being so alone. — Suzanne Collins

They're already taking my future! They can't have the things that mattered to me in the past! — Suzanne Collins

People deal with me, but they are genuinely fond of Prim. Maybe there will be enough fondness to keep her alive. — Suzanne Collins

Birds are settling down for the night, singing lullabies to their young. — Suzanne Collins

Kids have so much screen time, and it's a concern. I know how overloaded I can feel sometimes. — Suzanne Collins

Don't want that, do they?" She throws back her head and shouts, "Whole country in rebellion? Wouldn't want anything like that! — Suzanne Collins

The Hunger Games were an opportunity for wealth and a kind of glory not seen elsewhere. Of course, the people of 2 swallowed the Capitol's propaganda more easily than the rest of us. Embraced their ways. But for all that, at the end of the day, they were still slaves. — Suzanne Collins

Fingers encircle a blackberry and pluck it from its stem. I roll it gently between my thumb and forefinger. Suddenly, I turn to him and toss it in his direction. "And may the odds - " I say. I throw it high so he has plenty of time to decide whether to knock it aside or accept it. Gale's eyes train on me, not the berry, but at the last moment, he opens his mouth and catches it. He chews, swallows, and there's a long pause before he says " - be ever in your favor. — Suzanne Collins

He tucks me in and says good night but I catch his hand and hold him there. A side effect of the sleep syrup is that it makes people less inhibited, like white liquor, and I know I have to control my tongue. — Suzanne Collins

And like a fool, I bought into it. — Suzanne Collins

Katniss Everdeen, The Girl On Fire! — Suzanne Collins

Lean down a minute first," he says. "Need to tell you something." I lean over and put my good ear to his lips, which tickle as he whispers. "Remember, we're madly in love, so it's all right to kiss me anytime you feel like it." I jerk my head back but end up laughing. "Thanks, I'll keep it in mind. — Suzanne Collins

Like our home, this is a place that he has no right, but ultimately every right, to occupy. I — Suzanne Collins

Yes. I killed him. And buried her in flowers," I say. "And I sang her to sleep. — Suzanne Collins

Delly lost her temper at Peeta over how he treated you. She got very squeaky. It was like someone stabbing a mouse with a fork repeatedly. — Suzanne Collins

You can't," says Peeta. He holds out his hand into seemingly empty space. There's a sharp zap and he jerks it back. "Some kind of electric field throws you back on the roof." "Always worried about our safety," I say. Even though Cinna has shown Peeta the roof, I wonder if we're supposed to be up here now, so late and alone. I've never seen tributes on the Training Center roof before. But that doesn't mean we're not being taped. "Do you think they're watching us now?" "Maybe," he admits. "Come see the garden." On the other side of the — Suzanne Collins

She must have really loved him to leave her home for the Seam. I try to remember that when all I can see is the woman who sat by, blank and unreachable, while her children turned to skin and bones. I try to forgive her for my father's sake. But to be honest, I'm not the forgiving type. — Suzanne Collins

Most of the Peacekeepers turn a blind eye to the few of us who hunt because they're as hungry as we are for fresh meat as anyone. In fact, they're among our best customers. — Suzanne Collins

I wish she was dead,' he says. 'I wish they were all dead and we were, too. It would be best. — Suzanne Collins

So we both strip off our boots and socks and, while there's some improvement, I could swear he's making an effort to snap every branch we encounter — Suzanne Collins

I want to die as myself. — Suzanne Collins

Well you are a piece of work aren't you? — Suzanne Collins

In 'The Hunger Games,' in most people's idea, in terms of rebellion or a civil-war situation, that would meet the criteria for a necessary war. These people are oppressed, their children are being taken off and put in gladiator games. They're impoverished, they're starving, they're brutalized. — Suzanne Collins

My father was career military. He was a veteran, he was a doctor of political science, he taught at West Point and Air Command Staff and lectured at the War College. — Suzanne Collins

Do it. Before they send those mutts back or something. I don't want to die like Cato," he says.
"Then you shoot me," I say furiously, shoving the weapons back at him. "You shoot me and go home and live with it!" And as I say it, I know death right here, right now would be the easier of the two. — Suzanne Collins

If we burn, You will burn with us! — Suzanne Collins

Blood like raindrops on the window. — Suzanne Collins

How is he?" "He's a royal pain, frankly. He eats three times as much as the rest of us, yet he can't seem to get the knack of hunting. If we don't feed him he whines. So, of course, we do feed him and then he grows another six inches and whines louder. — Suzanne Collins

If she cries, he will nose his way into her arms and curl up there until she calms down and falls asleep. I'm so glad I didn't drown him. — Suzanne Collins

I poke around in the pile, about to settle on some cod chowder, when Peeta holds out a can to me. "Here."
I take it, not knowing what to expect. The label reads LAMB STEW. — Suzanne Collins

So I learned to hold my tongue and to turn my features into an indifferent mask so that no one could ever read my thoughts. — Suzanne Collins

You can't miss your schedule. Every morning, you're supposed to stick your right arm in this contraption in the wall. It tattoos the smooth inside of your forearm with your schedule for the day in a sickly purple ink. 7:00 - Breakfast. 7:30 - Kitchen Duties. 8:30 - Education Center, Room 17. And so on. The ink is indelible until 22:00 - Bathing — Suzanne Collins

Well, I don't have much competition here."
"You don't have much competition anywhere. — Suzanne Collins

Don't. Don't let's pretend when there's no one around. — Suzanne Collins

But just before they cut back to the main newscaster, I see the unmistakable flash of that same mockingjay's wing. The reporter has simply been incorporated into the old footage. She's not in District 13 at all. Which begs the question, What is? — Suzanne Collins

Then it's just Venia, whose skin is so pale her tattoos appear to be leaping off it. Almost rigid with determination, she does my hair and nails and makeup, fingers flying swiftly to compensate for her absent teammates. The whole time, she avoids my gaze. It's only when Cinna shows up to approve me and dismiss her that she takes my hands, looks me straight in the eye, and says, "We would all like you to know what a ... privilege it has been to make you look your best." Then she hastens from the room. — Suzanne Collins

I'm banged up and bloody and someone seems to be hammering on my left temple from inside my skull. — Suzanne Collins

They can't hurt me. I'm — Suzanne Collins

You know, you're kind of squeamish for such a lethal person — Suzanne Collins

Then something unexpected happens. At least, I don't expect it because I don't think of District 12 as a place that cares about me. But a shift has occurred since I stepped up to take Prim's place, and now it seems I have become someone precious. At first one, then another, then almost every member of the crowd touches the three middle fingers of their left hand to their lips and holds it out to me. It is an old and rarely used gesture of our district, occasionally seen at funerals. It means thanks, it means admiration, it means good-bye to someone you love. — Suzanne Collins

The girl on fire. — Suzanne Collins

Peeta crouches down on the other side of her and strokes her hair. When he begins to speak in a soft voice, it seems almost nonsensical, but the words aren't for me. With my paint box at home, I can make every color imaginable. Pink. As pale as a baby's skin. Or as deep as rhubarb. Green like spring grass. Blue that shimmers like ice on water. — Suzanne Collins

I wrote 'The Hunger Games' in a chair, like a La-Z-Boy chair, next to my bed. I had an office, but my kids sort of took it over. — Suzanne Collins

Amazingly similar in the execution. A bow pulled, an arrow shot. Entirely different in the aftermath. I killed a boy whose name I don't even know. Somewhere his family is weeping for him. His friends call for my blood. Maybe he had a girlfriend who really believed he would come back ... — Suzanne Collins

I can hear him weeping but I don't care. They probably won't even bother to question her, she's so far gone. Gone right off the deep end years ago in her Games. There's a good chance I'm headed in the same direction. Maybe I'm already going crazy and no one has the heart to tell me. I feel crazy enough. — Suzanne Collins

Oh, the fun we two have together. — Suzanne Collins

I find myself focusing up at the sky - the only roof left - because too many memories are drowning me. — Suzanne Collins

In theory, sure, Gregor could still go home. Pack up his three-year-old sister, Boots, get his mom out of the hospital, where she was recovering from the plague, and have his bat, Ares, fly them back up to the laudry room of their appartment building in New York City. Ares, his bond, who saved his life numerous times and who had had nothing but suffering since he had met Gregor. He tried to imagine the parting. "Well, Ares, it's been great. I'm heading home now. I know by leaving I'm completely dooming to annihilation everbody who's helped me down here, but I'm really not up for this whole war thing anymore. So, fly you high, you know?" Like that would ever happen. — Suzanne Collins

Theoretically, we should — Suzanne Collins

But the real star of the evening is food. — Suzanne Collins

Gale is mine. I am his. Anything else is unthinkable. — Suzanne Collins

I'm on a frosting sailboat, tossed around by blue-green waves, the deck shifting beneath my feet. — Suzanne Collins

way the Capitol shows it on television, but there's next to no life aboveground. In the seventy-five — Suzanne Collins

My name is Katniss Everdeen. I am seventeen years old. My home is District 12. I was in the Hunger Games. I escaped. The Capitol hates me ... — Suzanne Collins

Time to say thank you and farewell! trills Effie at my elbow. It's one of those moments when I just love her compulsive punctuality. We collect Cinna and Portia, and she escorts us around to say good-bye to important people, then herds us to the door. — Suzanne Collins

Finnick looks at Johanna and raises his eyebrows. He will not go forward without her. — Suzanne Collins

Several sets of arms would embrace me. But in the end, the only person I truly want to comfort me is Haymitch, because he loves Peeta, too. I reach out for him and say something like his name and he's there, holding me and patting my back. "It's okay. It'll be okay, sweetheart." He sits me on a length of broken marble pillar and keeps an arm around me while I sob. — Suzanne Collins

The pounding music, the cheers, the admiration work their way into my blood, and I can't suppress my excitement. Cinna has given me a great advantage. No one will forget me. Not my look, not my name. Katniss. The girl who was on fire. For — Suzanne Collins

Shame isn't a strong enough word for what I feel.
"You could live a hundred lifetimes and not deserve him, you know," Haymitch says. — Suzanne Collins

Oh, Peeta, Don't make me sorry I restarted your heart. — Suzanne Collins

Mutually counting on each other, watching each other's backs, forcing each other to be brave. — Suzanne Collins

Let the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games begin, Cato, I think. Let them begin for real. A cold breeze has sprung — Suzanne Collins

Floating on my back, as I am now, — Suzanne Collins

In stark contrast to two nights ago, when I felt Peeta was a million miles away, I'm struck by his immediacy now. As we settle in, he pulls my head down to use his arm as a pillow; the other rests protectively over me even when he goes to sleep. No one has held me like this in such a long time. Since my father died and I stopped trusting my mother, no one else's arms have made me feel this safe. — Suzanne Collins

People in this arena weren't crowned for their compassion — Suzanne Collins

It'd be better if he were easier to hate. — Suzanne Collins

I try to catch flies in cups and put them outside. After I wrote 'The Underland Chronicles' ... well, once you start naming cockroaches, you lose your edge. — Suzanne Collins

I wish they were all dead and we were, too. It would be best.
Well, there's no good response to that. I can hardly dispute it since I was walking around with a syringe to kill Peeta when I found them. Do I really want him dead? What I want ... what I want is to have him back. — Suzanne Collins

One slip. One slip in thousands. The odds had been entirely in her favor. But it hadn't mattered. — Suzanne Collins

District 12: Where you can starve to death in safety. — Suzanne Collins

It crosses my mind that Cinna's calm and normal demeanor masks a complete madman. — Suzanne Collins

You could do a lot worse. — Suzanne Collins

Sometimes I listen to them and sometimes I just watch the perfect line of Coin's hair and try to decide if it's a wig. — Suzanne Collins