If you missed the first two articles, you can find them here:
Why The Hunger Games Works as Dystopian Fiction
The Hunger Games as Harbinger

Warning: contains spoilers

One of the greatest decisions that Suzanne Collins made in The Hunger Games was to not make Katniss the revolutionary leader. To have her be a reluctant figurehead, and to eventually kill the revolutionary leader because Coin was about to usher in a new dystopia.

Because she refused to compliantly play Coin’s game, Katniss was able to stay slightly removed from the revolution and remain more objective and therefore critical of it—even as she was fighting for those she loved and the chance to escape the oppressive system all the districts had been broken under since the end of the war. She was on the edge of the inside—the place of every prophet.

Which brings me onto the main topic of this reflection. Katniss’ moral position is one reason that the love triangle with Gale and Peeta worked so effectively. Gale was right in the centre of the revolution, actively pushing it, and was ultimately responsible for the winning tactic that both killed Prim—the very person Katniss got involved in the first place to save—and forced the surrender of the Capitol.

Peeta, on the other hand, was the complete opposite. He was even more opposed to violence than Katniss, willing to sacrifice his life rather than take another’s, and determined to remain true to himself—to not let the Games change him. That’s why his capture and torture by the Capitol was so devastating.

In a sense, the choice between Peeta and Gale mirrored the choice Katniss needed to make at the end—save herself and perpetuate the dystopia, or sacrifice and stand for something true. Anyone who thinks she should have chosen Gale missed something very important in the story—the whole point of it in fact.

I haven’t written love triangles as such in any of my books so far, but the protagonists are faced with choices that will prove who they are—and there are definitely conflicting loves involved. I loved writing these heart-wrenching chapters perhaps more than I should have! I hope you love them too when you read them.