Tehlor Kay Mejia: It’s an interesting question, for me especially, because I originally wrote the first draft of “We Set the Dark on Fire” when Obama was still president. Sarah Hansell: Can you talk about why you chose fantasy as the medium for this story? How does fantasy as a genre fit for this story about resistance and revolution? YOUNG ACTIVISTS: Five teenagers at the forefront of Portland’s climate movement
It explores the resistance movement in the novel, La Voz, and also celebrates youth activism in a time when young people are making headlines for leading movements. The sequel, “We Unleash the Merciless Storm,” is about taking the fight to the ground. Then, Trump was elected, and she began to see the political landscape reflect, in many ways, the story she had written. As a third-generation Mexican-American, the dystopia came from her imagination of “the worst thing that could happen” for her community. Mejia, a self-taught writer, wrote the novel during Obama’s presidency. With a revolution brewing, she is asked to spy for the resistance - all while she begins to develop feelings for another girl.
The main character, Dani, is a teenage girl who lives in the upper-class world, but hides the secret of her lower-class origins. It’s set in a Latin American world where upper-class women’s options are to become either a first or second wife, and the poor are separated by a border wall. She didn’t, of course, and her first book, “We Set the Dark on Fire,” was published early last year. Yet, when Mejia was trying to sell her first book, “We Set the Dark on Fire,” publishers told her it was too “niche” to have a main character who was both Latinx and queer. According to data collected by author Malinda Lo, mainstream publishers published 79 books with LGBTQ+ main characters in 2016. Just less than 6% of children’s and YA books published in 2018 were by Latinx authors, according to the Cooperative Children’s Book Center. Mejia’s books come at a time when diversity in YA literature is steadily increasing, but still has a long way to go. 24, Oregon author Tehlor Kay Mejia’s sophomore novel, “We Unleash the Merciless Storm,” a young adult (YA) queer Latinx fantasy set in a dystopian reality, will hit the shelves.
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