See People magazine double issue #116/117, August 20/27, 2010.

See her interview in School Library Journal: http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/slj/home/885800-312/the_last_battle_with_mockingjay.html.csp.

Some kind of campaign or political process is implied in Mockingjay, where Coin first tries to get Katniss killed off by Peeta—deflecting any blame away from herself—to thwart any attempt by Katniss to become president after Snow, or to keep her from supporting any rival of Coin’s.

When Snow confronts Katniss with knowledge that she disappears “into the woods with him each Sunday,” she has no idea how he knows this (Catching Fire). Are they being tracked by people, cameras?

“I’d grown up seeing those home kids at school. The sadness, the marks of angry hands on their faces, the hopelessness that curled their shoulders forward” (The Hunger Games).

Snow’s agenda is more upfront. As Snow tells Katniss in Mockingjay, “I think we’ll make this whole situation a lot simpler by agreeing not to lie to each other.” And Katniss to her surprise answers, “Yes, I think that would save time.”

Rather, her one thought is she never wants to marry and have children. All children born in Panem are destined to become future tributes in the Hunger Games—a fate Katniss refuses to accept for anyone she loves ever again, if she can help it.

His fiction about Katniss’ pregnancy is in a way an extension of his talent at camouflage, an ability Katniss makes fun of when they are in the Training Center but one that saves his life in the arena when, injured, he hides in plain sight, using mud and leaves to blend in to the ground. He is so good that even Katniss does not see him until she almost steps on him.

Oh, yes, Katniss’ feelings are unequivocal when it comes to one other creature. She really hates Buttercup. She wishes often she’d drowned him instead of giving him to Prim. But eventually she embraces him as a remnant of all she has ever loved in Prim, the way, when someone close to you dies, even the scent lingering on a shirt, or dress, brings you momentarily close to that person’s spirit. Buttercup holds a bit of Prim inside of him and by the end of Katniss’ journey she also finds him one of her most trusted companions. His loyalty and fierceness, after all, matches her own.

Dana Goodyear, “Man of Extremes: The Return of James Cameron,” in The New Yorker: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/10/26/091026fa_fact_goodyear.

“James Dean Quotes,” ThinkQuest: http://thinkexist.com/quotation/to_grasp_the_full_significance_of_life_is_the/256995.html.

Ba Kiwanuka, “900,000 New Blogs Created Everyday Means Yours is Irrelevant Unless ...”: http://www.articlealley.com/article_78118_64.html.

Charles Cross, Heavier Than Heaven: A Biography of Kurt Cobain.

“Oasis: What’s the Story”: http://www.musicfanclubs.org/oasis/act1.html.

If you would like to make a judgment, be my guest: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nyMJ1D7HfEc.

See “Altered animals: Creatures with bonus features” in New Scientist, July 2010.

See “Scientist accused of playing God after creating artificial life by making designer microbe from scratch, but could it destroy humanity?” in The Daily Mail, July 2010.

Psychologist William James came up with this description in 1890. It’s hard to do any better.

We all have memory “triggers,” but most of our memories are not intrusive and painful. The smell of car wax might remind you of a summer afternoon with your big brother, or a bite of licorice could send you zooming back in time to the day you learned to tie your shoes.

See J. K. Hamlin, K. Wynn, & P. Bloom’s “Social evaluation by preverbal infants,” published in Nature, Nov 22, 2007.

See Maguen, et al.’s “The Impact of Direct and Indirect Killing on Mental Health Symptoms in Iraq War Veterans” published in Journal of Traumatic Stress, February 2010.

Always with the mice ... Seriously, the progress in memory research is astonishing. While I was writing this essay, several major breakthroughs were announced.

Supposedly, Spartacus was killed in the final battle of the war when he and his rebels attacked the Roman army, although his body was never found. The surviving rebels were crucified by Roman soldiers.

And who was a great inspiration to George Washington. Quote from William Calhoun, “Washington at Newburgh,” The Claremont Institute.