WE SET THE DARK ON FIRE by Tehlor Kay Mejia

Rating: A campfire that keeps going out and needing to be rekindled.

Highlight of note: It's a sapphic romance with Latinx flavorings.

Will you read the next book in this series? Possibly. If I notice when it comes out and still remember this book. (There's no release yet, but I'm assuming sometime in 2020.) 

I was really excited when I read the prologue for this book and found out the society I was going to be reading about imitated a god who had two wives. Was this a polyamorous YA novel? If so, it would only be the second one I'd come across. Sadly, it was not. Although the families at the upper end of the society all feature men with two wives, he's only sexually involved with one of them and the women aren't expected to be more than friends. It's actually really insulting as one wife, the Primera, is expected to be intelligent while the other, the Segunda, is expected to be sexy. Because according to these people, women can't (or shouldn't?) be both.

The polygamy is set up to be one of the broken things about the governing class of the island. It's better to be lower class and love one person. The notion that there could be triads out there where they all love each other is never floated, despite the fact that the parents-in-law in this novel are presented as having a well functioning marriage. Part of this is the upper class people not marrying for love trope, but since the polygamy is limited to the upper classes, it comes across as undesirable and something people shouldn't be cool with. And, honestly, the way they do it is messed up to me.

The story focuses on a teen named Dani. We meet her just before she is married to a young man who may be destined to be the next leader of their nation. The husband never shows any sign of redeeming qualities, being a shallow spoiled brat sort of villian. The other woman in their marriage is Carmen, who has been bullying Dani the entire five years they were at wife school. (Yes, wife school. They called it something else. I forget what. But it was wife school.) She is the love interest.

I was actually a little surprised and happy Carmen wound up as the love interest. I had thought it was going to be the male revolutionary who showed up just before the wedding to provide Dani with fake identification papers and enlist her in the rebel cause. And they could still end up as a triad, although I doubt it as the author really doesn't seem to like the triad idea very much. If she did, she would have arranged the school differently. The girls go through taking separate classes for Primeras and Segundas, and having little to do with each other except in passing. Someone who thought a three-way marriage was something that could be achieved happily would probably have set the school up so that the girls were paired earlier and allowed to bond with each other before meeting their husband. As it is, the only reason I can see for them being at the same school was to allow Dani and Carmen to have a history of hurt and antagonism.

I thought while I was reading it that I liked the book, but now that I'm writing about it I'm starting to think that maybe I didn't. I wasn't really very invested in Dani, so waiting over a week to write the review means I've forgotten some of what kept me going and am just remembering the things that bugged me. They're bugging me more now that there's no story to distract me from them. Looking over my notes, it seems I was more caught up in the romance than I remember being, so I suppose it worked well enough but lacked something that would make it truly memorable.

This is really a fairly standard dystopian YA. The teens are outraged about injustice and unfairness, and have valid reasons to be because the government is incredibly bad. Whole sections of the population are walled off to starve while the rich insult them for existing, the girls are trapped in a relationship with an arrogant and potentially violent creep, and the leaders of the resistance are all under twenty.

The vilains make little sense. The only reason the Garcia family indicates for choosing Dani to marry their son is that they think it will give them political pull to have him married to someone low class. (She's worse than they know. They think she's from near the wall, and thus undesirable. She's actually from over the wall, and thus not legally able to be near them at all.) It's never indicated that this really matters. While the leader of the government is called a president, it's pretty obvious that he's not the sort that makes it into office by popular vote. None of them have any depth, being caricatures of nasty elitist snobs.

Neither Dani nor Carmen really engaged me all that much, although I can't say why really. Yeah, Dani tries too hard to be an ice queen; she was trained to be one. But the problem there is the society, not Dani. I suppose that's the heart of my problem with the novel: it's less about overcoming oneself and more about destroying an evil society/government. A society/government that will, I'm sure, eventually be brought down by teenagers deciding to care. Maybe I'm just getting too jaded and old to believe in that sort of tale anymore.

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Below you'll find the notes I took as I read. Clearly, they contain major spoilers.

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Notes
3% Romantic triad in the prologue!

4% Whoa. So the MC's society expects everyone to be in a triad. This will either make me very happy or very annoyed. I'm already concerned about the society. It's not openly polyamorous. It's just that men all have two wives. So what happens to the other half of men? And what about a woman who wants two wives? How would a man with three wives be treated? Or one with a single wife for that matter? 

(Note from later: apparently only ruling class men get two wives. Lower classes enter two person unions, but I suspect they're bitter about it because they'll have fewer available women than if rich guys didn't get two.)

(Note from even later: apparently the Primera's aren't sexual with anyone? Not the husbands, not the Segundas, not random gardeners... That's messed up, because I'm pretty sure they aren't all asexual and a lot of them would like to have sex lives.)


8% An attractive rebel. His name is Sota, but I'm going to call him Love Interest.

11% So, what are the odds on this obnoxious Carmen person being the Segunda in Dani's marriage? It seems that should have been mentioned, but her counterpart hasn't been mentioned at all. Does she not know who it is? In which case it's almost definitely Carmen.

13% The marriage ceremonies are pretty sweet if you ignore that they're all arranged by people who aren't the participants.

13% Yep, her Segunda is Carmen.

20% Carmen is intriguing me. She's clearly smarter than a Segunda is supposed to be. And the line about the protesters will stop when they're not hungry anymore shows sympathy, or at least awareness of problems people unlike herself have. (Or are they unlike herself? She's supposed to be from a wealthy background, but she was on Dani's bus to school. I'm sure it went to other neighborhoods, but I doubt it went too far up the mountain.) Almost wondering if Carmen is the Love Interest rather than Soto. Or if they're supposed to be one of these "high class" triads that don't exist on the other side of the wall.

23% Yeah, I'm with Dani that it's freaky how Mateo is looking at Carmen. It's also a little weird that a Primera doesn't have to have sex. I wonder if some of them do or if that's looked down on. Also, it sucks that the Segunda is supposed to serve meals like she's a servant. Is that regular or just this messed up family?

28% Nice tearing of a new asshole, Dani! Soto is clearly too used to being able to get girls to do what he wants them to.

29% Carmen saw Soto leave. Somehow I'm not surprised. I am surprised she was out collecting caterpillars.

42% After knowing her for over five years, Dani still knows nothing of Carmen's background. That supports my theory that Carmen isn't what she pretends to be 

43% Um, yeah, so Dani definitely seems to be attracted to undressed Carmen...

51% Mateo just becomes less and less likable. He started out spoiled and insincere but is in danger of being a caricature of a bad guy at this point. I'd like to see him have a bit of personality beyond being odious.

53% And, yes, Carmen was on the bus way back when because she was from near the wall too. I really don't understand how the otherwise intelligent Dani never figured that out. It does make one wonder though; why did the Garcias, who are the worst of elitists, pick the two girls from the wall? The Primera choosing Dani for political appearances almost makes sense, but Mama Garcia is openly hateful about salty blood, so why pick a girl from the wall to bear her grandchildren?

Also... Yeah, Carmen is most definitely a love interest.

54% Mama Garcia knows someone's been in contact with someone. My bet is she has something on Carmen, not Dani. I'm thinking both the marriages were designed as traps.

55% Hmm... Why does Mama Garcia smell funny? Something floral over something metallic... perfume to cover up illness? Or poison?

58% This date the girls are on is adorable.

61% I like the transformation in Dani's grit.

63% I somehow doubt Carmen is buying the pretense behind this trip. But even if she is, this seems like the sort of like it's easy to get caught in. What happens when the family tries to send flowers to someone who isn't in the hospital and never was?

76% The scene with Carmen and Dani assuring each other their feelings are real was intense and touching. Very well done.

85% Mama Garcia's having an affair with the driver??? I did NOT see that coming.

87% Yeah, I have a lot of questions about Alex knowing Carmen. Because she really seems to.Was I right about her being a spy?

97% THE END
The lovers separate. Dani's mission goes on. Carmen is with the resistance. Sucks to be Dani right now.