Can't Catch Me Now / The Hunger Games

✸ I'm here, I'm there, I'm everywhere

The 25th Hunger Games: a song for the forgotten.

It's been fifteen years since Lucy Gray Baird sang her way to victory in the 10th Hunger Games... and vanished into legend. Her songs still haunt the woods of District 12 but her name has become more myth than memory. Only her sister, Annabel Blue Baird, still believes she's alive. Somewhere out there, free beneath an open sky. Singing ballads like a songbird, slithering like a snake.

Now twenty-three, Annabel Blue has built a quiet life among the remnants of the Covey, the traveling musicians who were once beloved and now despised. Their loyal audience is gone. Though president Snow has nothing to do with it. A bitter man named Asher has turned the district against them. His rumours that the Covey bring sickness, steal food, and poison hearts can be heard echoing through the streets. So when the very first Quarter Quell is announced- the 25th Hunger Games, where the people themselves must vote for their tributes- Asher makes sure the ballots fall cruelly.

Belly Blue, with her haunting voice and too-familiar face, and Clancy Scarlet, a young red-haired Covey boy with too much laughter for this world, are chosen as District 12's lambs to the slaughter. The nightingale and the robin, offered up for a nation's entertainment.

Their assigned mentor, Jack Reed, a kindhearted victor from District 11, tries to keep them alive with warmth and strategy. But the Capitol's Prehistoric Arena- a blistering expanse of ancient jungles, venomous plants, and dangerous creatures long extinct- has no mercy. As alliances form with tributes Rosemary and Thyme, also from District 11, music becomes the only thing that still feels human.

When survival turns to sacrifice, and the past echoes through every song, Belly Blue must decide how she wants to be remembered: as the sister of a ghost, or as the girl who raised her voice to sing anyway?

Because even in the Capitol's cruelest arena, some songs refuse to die.

✸ Can't Catch Me Now, 2025

Isabela Merced...

ANNABEL BLUE 'Belly Blue' BAIRD
( 23 ) District 12. The Nightingale. Covey.