"The truth is if the pain ever truly went away I think I'd finally swallow a handful of nightlock."

Wow, you really captured Joanna in that one sentence. That was one of my favorite things about the book (how the victors were all either drunks, morphling addicts, sociopaths, on on their way to becoming one of those things). It's just so real.

And in so many ways, the way the victors handle things post-games is so much more interesting than what happened in the games.