The Fire Sermon

Synopsis:

When Zach and I were born our parents must have counted and recounted: limbs, fingers, toes. The complete set. They would have been disbelieving – nobody dodged the split between Alpha and Omega. Nobody. Born as twins. Raised as enemies. One strong Alpha twin and one mutated Omega; the only thing they share is the moment of their death. The Omegas live in segregation, cast out by their families as soon as their mutation becomes clear. Forced to live apart, they are ruthlessly oppressed by their Alpha counterparts. The Alphas are the elite. Once their weaker twin has been cast aside, they’re free to live in privilege and safety, their Omega twin far from their thoughts. Cass and Zach are both perfect on the outside: no missing limbs, no visible Omega mutation. But Cass has a secret: one that Zach will stop at nothing to expose. The potential to change the world lies in both their hands. One will have to defeat the other to see their vision of the future come to pass, but if they’re not careful both will die in the struggle for power.

Summary:

An entrancing dystopian tale which raises more questions than answers while dragging us across a desolate landscape twisted by pride, greed and purity.

My thoughts:

The Fire Sermon is set in a dystopian world where everyone has twins, a boy and a girl. This serves as a reminder of the Before and the Blast which devastated the world and made it the way it is now.

Out of the twins one is an Alpha -healthy and normal, and one is an omega – weak, deformed, a dead end, poisonous. In this harsh new world, Alphas are on top, their twins, the Omegas are at the bottom, and are consistently pushed further underground. The hatred and separation of the two is right at the forefront, with Omega’s branded from birth, given away, forced to pay tithes for the privilege of living on the same land, usually in deprived areas with little to no food or healthy soil to grow it in and ultimately, straining to survive.

The initial divide is known as the split, where the ‘poisonous’ Omega is sent away to live with their own kind in an Omega community. Unfortunately for Cass and Zach, neither are born with any physically obvious deformities, and as the split draws out longer and longer, both twins become alienated from their Alpha society, and Zach becomes increasingly eager in exposing Cass for what she really is in order to gain his rightful place.

Cass is a Seer, Omega’s blighted with visions of the future but also the past. The Blast frequents their waking and dreaming life so much that most are drawn to insanity before they grow old. Unfortunately for Cass, Seer’s are not welcome among either side due to the nature of their powers and visions of the Before, which have become strictly taboo. This includes all manner of objects, including machinery and the Electric.

One huge flaw in the segregation of Alpha’s and Omega’s is that if one twin dies, so does the other. An alpha wanting to dispose of another Alpha merely has to kill their twin, they can hold their twin for ransom, blackmail, power, the possibilities are endless. It is ironic that despite all their efforts to shun the Omega’s out and put them at the bottom of the pile, they must also protect them for their own sakes, which leads to some uniquely terrifying ways of keeping them ‘safe’.

Initially, I found the story slow going, especially since a large brunt of the beginning happens in the same room with only memories and visions giving us insight to the outside world and Cass’s past, but even though we remained within four walls, the mystery, the visions and visits from her sibling, Zach, were enough to keep my interest piqued and practically salivating for the moment where our protagonist would finally pluck up the courage to do something. This, despite my best efforts, was one reason why I didn’t particularly like Cass, but I admired her resilience.

The plot on the whole didn’t follow the cliche’s of some Dystopian novels available to date, and played out more like a cat and mouse hunt with the added mystery of a hidden island that offered sanctuary from the oppression of Alpha’s. All along the way, bit by bit, the history of the After falls into place, though we are still left in the dark for the most part, and the gritty secrets of Cass’s brother and his plans come to light.

One thing that stood out for me in particular was that their was no overseeing government, it is simply Alpha against Omega, with the main players pushing the pieces around the board as it were – all taking names in order to hide their true identity to avoid the possibility of their family or twin being obtained for future blackmailing opportunities.

For a book that spends a lot of time on the road, moving from one place to the other, I never felt the story dried up in the slightest. It is very engaging, and the pacing is spot on, urging us through stark revelations and intense action from the start.

Cass is a physcially weak character(in my opinion) but she more than makes up for it by being strong willed and strong minded. She vouches for equality of both Alpha and Omega, despite the Alpha’s ever-growing disdain against them and the Omega’s own blindness of their actions of war, where one person dies, someone, somewhere also drops down dead, it’s not one death, it’s two. And considering we are fed a clear picture of an almost desolate world wiped away by nuclear warfare, they need every person they can get as they face the very real threat of extinction. I didn’t see much of a character arc for Cass, she was very much an open book throughout, wearing her weakness on her sleeve and only coming into her own at the last moment. I hope that she has a much wider arc that passes into the sequel so she can grow into a more wholesome character.

Kip, on the other hand was brilliant. I loved him and at times, thought that he was the protagonist. Kip is the flint to Cass’s tinder, he spurs her to act, think for herself instead of others, and play the game just like her brother. I’m hoping that now Cass’s tinder has been sparked, it will continue to burn and set ablaze when the story comes to a close.

Final Thoughts:

A strong player for the dystopian genre, with epic world building and a grim future for humanity. I can’t wait to read more from this world and see how Cass grows as a character.