In Suzanne Collins’s young-adult novel The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, Coriolanus Snow is assigned to mentor Lucy Gray Baird.
The novel takes place during the 10th Hunger Games, decades before Katniss Everdeen’s story. Snow is an ambitious student at the Capitol’s Academy, and each student is assigned a tribute to mentor. Lucy Gray is the female tribute from District 12, making her Snow’s responsibility.
Lucy Gray is introduced as a performer who sings “The Hanging Tree,” a song that becomes important to the story. Snow’s efforts to help her turn the Games into a more watchable spectacle, while their relationship exposes the political and moral foundations of his later career.
Collins published the prequel in 2020. Lucy Gray’s surname is Baird, not Everdeen; the two characters are connected by District 12 and music, but they are different people.