Reading: Catching Fire

Another summary for Catching Fire! This one goes up through page 150. What's going on with Gale?

Katniss has fallend asleep at Gale's bed, or actually Gale's table side. She's awakened by Peeta who tells her to go get some sleep. In her bed Katniss is haunted by nightmares from the Games. The swelling from Katniss's welt has gone down and she's able to see the blizzard going on outside. Katniss thinks of how the Peacekeepers won't be able to reach her in the blizzard. She contemplates her death by them and realizes that her family might suffer the same future as her.
She sees this as her opportunity and considers Gale's idea of starting their own uprising. Knowing that she'd need to be good with words, she hopes Peeta will help her. A side from her daydreaming, she goes down to check on Gale. Her mother has him in a 'snow coat' and it has so much effect that Katniss "can almost hear the sizzle of Gale's tormented skin meeting the snow mixture." At this point Katniss is admiring the one thing she thinks her mother can do right. She describes how her mother is a totally different human being when she's working with a patient. She apologizes to her mom for yelling at her the other day and her mom responds with: "I've heard worse. You've seen how people are, when some they love is in pain." This sends Katniss on a whirlwind of emotions trying to figure out if she loves Gale or not or what type of love it is.
Katniss calls Peeta's house to make sure he's made it home fine during the blizzard. They arrange to meet later in the day to talk about running away or starting an uprising. Now she's changed her mind and doesn't want to runaway. The two let Haymitch in on their ideas and he totally ignores them because he doesn't think it will work. While on their walk they observe the new changes that have been made to the district. The number and intensity of Peacekeepers have increase. The peacekeepers have set the Hob on fire.
After observing her neighbors she realizes a tragic flaw of all the people who live in District 12; none of them are willing to break the law, and without this an uprising would be a failure. The townspeople have shut themselves up in their houses and have stopped using Gale and Katniss's mothers' services by fear of association. Everyone's starving, the mines have been shut down, and more and more kids are signing up for tesserae but they don't receive their grain. The district's taken over by a temporary food shortage.
To help Gale's family, Katniss convinces Haymitch to hire Gale's mom as his housekeeper; this improves both of their lives. One day Katniss leaves the district and takes off for the woods where she carefully covers her tracks the entire way. She grabs her bow and arrow and heads off for the lake. One her walk Katniss hears the click of a gun behind her and instinctly draws her arrow. It's a Peacekeeper. It's a woman. Katniss thinks she's going to be taken into the Capitol for torturing, but the woman holds out a small circular piece of bread/cracker that's been imprinted with a mockingjay. This confuses Katniss, why has the mockingjay become such a popular symbol? Flashback to the man at the party from the Victory Tour with the pocket watch that had the mockingjay on it.
Katniss asks what the cracker means and the woman simply says: "It means we're on your side." She finds the other woman's partner in the little concrete house. Turns out the two, Twill and Bonnie, are from District 8 and have ran away and hope to reach the remains of District 13. They explain how they stole two Peacekeeper uniforms and picked up the gun from a dead Peacekeeper. She shares her food with the starving women as they continue to share their stories. They admit that the whole whistling salute from the Victory Tour ceremony was planned by everyone. The people planned to take over the centers of power, like the Justice Building etc. Because everyone in District 8 was require to get together to watch Katniss and Peeta's proposal interview, it was the perfect time for them to meet and arrange the uprising.
All hell broke loose in District 8 and the two women made a run for it. The townspeople were hoping for word of the uprising to spread to the other districts as well. However, this didn't look to good. Peacekeepers came in swarms all over the area and bombed a ton of rebel strongholds. The area went on lockdown for a week, but eventually everything went back to normal. There was an explosion in the textile building and the women managed to steal some goods from the dead workers.
They women explain that they're running to District 13 because they believe that it's not really rubble like the Capitol has been showing. The two suspect that the Capitol has been using the same footage from the area year after year. They think that the people from 13 survived, and have been left alone because they used to specialize in nuclear development.
Katniss takes Twill out and teaches her the basics of hunting. She also makes a new crutch for Bonnie and gives her an extra pair of socks. Then she tells them what's going on in District 12, but only because they're dying to know. The ladies talk about how Katniss is well liked by the entire district and Katniss realizes that President Snow has been playing her for a fool. His threats were obvious distractions to keep her from influencing the uprising.
She hears a mockingjay and thinks back to the pocket watch and the cracker and what they could possibly mean. She takes off for home, but when she reaches the fence it's buzzing with electricity.

Stay tuned for a new summary. Who's on Katniss's side? What will become of the uprising? Will Katniss ever make it into the district again?