So Let Them Burn is a powerhouse of a book. Kamilah Cole burns the world down and then some in this incendiary debut, full of dragons, danger, and deceit.
This is exceptionally good YA fantasy, with brilliant characterisation, tension, and twists. It has stabby sapphics, dragons, and terrific worldbuilding—what more could you ask for?
As a character driven reader, I was delighted to follow the stories of Faron and Elara—two sisters who follow distinctly different paths but still hold their love for one another and their country deeply within their hearts. Faron embodies the fascinating of what does The Chosen One do once their duty is over? This is such a thought-provoking take on the trope and ties into the central questions around legacy and fate. She is weighed down by the expectations resulting from a role she never really chose to take on, shouldering the title and really being a traumatised teenager driven to desperate measures. On the other hand, Elara inadvertently links herself to the Langley Empire when she unexpectedly bonds with one of their dragons. This creates a brilliant plot line around the masking of evil and the way colonial powers seek to define everything around themselves. It’s a pervasive and insidious forcible theft of culture, recentring themselves above all others. Both sisters have difficult journeys to undertake and Cole allows for some nuanced, three-dimensional and highly believable character development to occur. Everything at its core is about these two sisters and how they shoulder the fates thrust upon them, particularly in defence of their country and people.
Cole’s pacing is immaculate—keeping you hooked to every page while also allowing breathing room for character development to occur and a few fledging relationships to spark up. The dynamics are ever-changing and there is a tense undercurrent beneath it all. The atmosphere is one of survival, with a constant need to look over your shoulder. That fear contaminates everything. Cole also creates some expansive and rich world-building that promises to widen even more in the next book. I really enjoyed the grandiose mythology of it all, which also highlighted the disparity between the power of the gods and the humans as their mere pawns in a complex game we cannot fully understand. They embody the weight of legacy, but there are also some incredible surprises in store, which caught me completely off guard. It all culminates in a fantastic, explosive and twisty conclusion that had me gasping for breath and demanding the next book immediately.
This book deals with the emergence of a people from colonisation, with grief and trauma permeating everything and colonisers still seek to belittle and oppress them. You can constantly see the lingering effects of war and trauma upon all of the characters, especially when the former colonial power still holds so much over them. There has been a hard fought freedom, but it is still incredibly fraught. The pages of this are full of power plays, in a giant and twisty game of chess. For me, this added so much tension as every action had real ramifications that could affect much more than just the characters I had fallen in love with. Also, Cole is deeply concerned with questions of legacy and fate. Those are inextricably enmeshed with the idea of duty and that colonial legacy still influencing everything. All I can say is that you should drop everything to read this.
So Let Them Burn is a smouldering ember of a book that slowly stokes its rageful fire until it bursts out and leaves smoke in its wake. This is not a book you want to miss.
So Let Them Burn is available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other good book retailers, like your local bookstore, as of January 16th 2024.
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Synopsis | Goodreads
Whip-smart and immersive, this Jamaican-inspired fantasy follows a gods-blessed heroine who’s forced to choose between saving her sister or protecting her homeland—perfect for fans of Iron Widow and The Priory of the Orange Tree.
Faron Vincent can channel the power of the gods. Five years ago, she used her divine magic to liberate her island from its enemies, the dragon-riding Langley Empire. But now, at seventeen, Faron is all powered up with no wars to fight. She’s a legend to her people and a nuisance to her neighbors.
When she’s forced to attend an international peace summit, Faron expects that she will perform tricks like a trained pet and then go home. She doesn’t expect her older sister, Elara, forming an unprecedented bond with an enemy dragon—or the gods claiming the only way to break that bond is to kill her sister.
As Faron’s desperation to find another solution takes her down a dark path, and Elara discovers the shocking secrets at the heart of the Langley Empire, both must make difficult choices that will shape each other’s lives, as well as the fate of their world.
