When the Gamemakers renege on a promise to let two surviving tributes from the same district live, she defies and embarrasses the government by threatening a double suicide with Peeta, becoming the personal enemy of Panem's leader, President Coriolanus Snow. To survive, Katniss 'pretends' she loves him.

Katniss survives the game along with fellow tribute Peeta Mellark, who is in love with her. When Prim is 'reaped' (chosen by lottery) as a 'tribute' who must fight twenty-three other tributes to the death in the 74th Hunger Games, Katniss volunteers to take her sister's place. Her favorite color is green, (as she told Peeta when he offered friendship to her) because of her familiarity with the forest. Her father's death in a mining accident several years ago left her mother deeply depressed, forcing Katniss to become the mother figure and to use the hunting skills taught by her father to feed the family. She was named for an aquatic plant with edible underwater tubers by her father, who jokingly said that “If you can find yourself, you’ll never be hungry.” She lives with her mother and younger sister, Primrose Everdeen (nicknamed 'Prim'). She has long dark hair (hers is usually tied up in a braid), olive skin, and gray eyes, which are given as a characteristic of residents of the coal mining region of District 12 known as 'the Seam'. She is 16 years old at the beginning of the first book and is quiet, independent, and fierce. Katniss Everdeen, known as 'the girl on fire', is the main protagonist in the Hunger Games.

Hunger games second book