Summary
A Torch Against the Night by Sabaa Tahir is the sequel to An Ember in the Ashes, a New York Times Best Seller. An Ember in the Ashes follows Laia, Elias, and Helene as they fight for what they believe in. Laia fights for her brother who was taken by Martial soldiers, Elias fights for freedom from the only life he has ever known, and Helene fights for her Empire. In A Torch Against the Night, the adventure continues. Former best friends, Elias and Helene have no choice but to become enemies after Elias becomes a traitor to the Empire. Elias and Laia gang up and embark on a journey to save Laia’s brother from Kauf, the most brutal prison in the Empire, in hopes of giving the Scholar race a chance at survival. Helene, the Blood Shrike of the Empire, is tasked with assassinating Elias.
The story begins where the last book left off, and Elias and Laia barely escape the capital with their lives. Elias is stabbed by his mother, the Commandant, with a poisoned blade that ensures his death within a few months’ time. The poison causes Elias to have terrible seizures that take him to a world called the Waiting Place. The Waiting Place is where souls stay until they are ready to move on to the otherworld. Elias and Laia are forced to go off course (instead of traveling straight to Kauf to rescue Laia’s brother) to find Elias medicine that will subdue his seizures. While Elias is knocked out from one of his seizures, Laia treks into a town filled with shady people who wouldn’t think twice before turning her into the Empire. A group of men take interest in her when they realize who she is, and she is forced to show them where Elias is hidden. She tricks the men into coming alone into the cave where Elias is hidden and secretly feeds Elias the medicine she bought. When Elias wakes up, he fights the men alongside Laia, and they make their escape. On their way to Kauf, their friends Keenan and Izzy catch up with them. Because of the price on Elias’ head, they are forced to find a way new to travel together safely with such a large group. They do this by calling in a favor from a very powerful tribeswoman named Afya. Afya agrees to help them, but only a few days into their journey Elias learns that he only has two weeks to live. He decides that he must continue on alone and break Laia’s brother Darin out of Kauf before he dies from the poison. Shortly after, Laia and the rest of the gang are found when a group of Martials search one of the tribe’s caravans. Laia is mysteriously able to disappear and save everyone but one of the tribesmen and her friend Izzy. After Izzy’s death, Laia loses herself in grief and doubt. She and Keenan leave the tribe and continue to Kauf alone. Keenan manipulates Laia into giving him her family heirloom (which is actually a shard of the Star that is able to imprison Jinn) and leaves her with the knowledge that he is the Nightbringer—the most feared and cryptic creature in the Empire. Laia is barely able to contain her grief, but with the help of Afya, some children servants of Kauf, and even Helene, she is able to help break her brother and Elias (who had been captured in his attempt to free Darin) out of Kauf. During his time in the prison, Elias was weakened so much that he died, but while in the Waiting Place was able to make a bargain with the Jinn who ruled it. Elias agreed to become the new ruler of the Waiting Place in exchange for his life. The book ends when Darin finally wakes up from the coma he was in because of a blow to the head he suffered while trying to escape.
The story begins where the last book left off, and Elias and Laia barely escape the capital with their lives. Elias is stabbed by his mother, the Commandant, with a poisoned blade that ensures his death within a few months’ time. The poison causes Elias to have terrible seizures that take him to a world called the Waiting Place. The Waiting Place is where souls stay until they are ready to move on to the otherworld. Elias and Laia are forced to go off course (instead of traveling straight to Kauf to rescue Laia’s brother) to find Elias medicine that will subdue his seizures. While Elias is knocked out from one of his seizures, Laia treks into a town filled with shady people who wouldn’t think twice before turning her into the Empire. A group of men take interest in her when they realize who she is, and she is forced to show them where Elias is hidden. She tricks the men into coming alone into the cave where Elias is hidden and secretly feeds Elias the medicine she bought. When Elias wakes up, he fights the men alongside Laia, and they make their escape. On their way to Kauf, their friends Keenan and Izzy catch up with them. Because of the price on Elias’ head, they are forced to find a way new to travel together safely with such a large group. They do this by calling in a favor from a very powerful tribeswoman named Afya. Afya agrees to help them, but only a few days into their journey Elias learns that he only has two weeks to live. He decides that he must continue on alone and break Laia’s brother Darin out of Kauf before he dies from the poison. Shortly after, Laia and the rest of the gang are found when a group of Martials search one of the tribe’s caravans. Laia is mysteriously able to disappear and save everyone but one of the tribesmen and her friend Izzy. After Izzy’s death, Laia loses herself in grief and doubt. She and Keenan leave the tribe and continue to Kauf alone. Keenan manipulates Laia into giving him her family heirloom (which is actually a shard of the Star that is able to imprison Jinn) and leaves her with the knowledge that he is the Nightbringer—the most feared and cryptic creature in the Empire. Laia is barely able to contain her grief, but with the help of Afya, some children servants of Kauf, and even Helene, she is able to help break her brother and Elias (who had been captured in his attempt to free Darin) out of Kauf. During his time in the prison, Elias was weakened so much that he died, but while in the Waiting Place was able to make a bargain with the Jinn who ruled it. Elias agreed to become the new ruler of the Waiting Place in exchange for his life. The book ends when Darin finally wakes up from the coma he was in because of a blow to the head he suffered while trying to escape.
Favorite Quote:
"'Failure doesn't define you. It's what you do after you fail that determines whether you are a leader or a waste of perfectly good air'"(387).
Without this encouragement from Afya, Laia would have lost herself in self doubt. It is very important for people to understand that failure is inevitable. Without this knowledge, it is hard to rebound from mistakes. I believe it is very important to fail. Failure promotes growth and the ability to come back with new knowledge and strength.
Themes:
Slavery in the Roman Empire: Elements of slavery are present throughout the novel that are similar to the slavery of Ancient Rome.
Self-trust: Laia makes some bad decisions that cause her to start doubting herself. She almost gives up when the consequence of one of her mistakes could mean mass devastation, but when Afya tells her that “'Failure doesn’t define you. It’s what you do after you fail that determines if you are a leader or a waste of perfectly good air'”(387), she realizes that the best thing for her to do is try to make up for it.
Holocaust: The prison Kauf is reminiscent of the concentration camps in the Holocaust, and the Warden is very similar to Dr. Mengele, a man famous for performing inhumane experiments on his prisoners during WWII. The mass killings of the Scholar race mirrors the genocide of the Jews.
Darwinism: Darwinism is the theory that nature weeds out the weak. The Commandant and Warden feel that they are obligated to weed out the weak by killing the Scholar race.
Self-trust: Laia makes some bad decisions that cause her to start doubting herself. She almost gives up when the consequence of one of her mistakes could mean mass devastation, but when Afya tells her that “'Failure doesn’t define you. It’s what you do after you fail that determines if you are a leader or a waste of perfectly good air'”(387), she realizes that the best thing for her to do is try to make up for it.
Holocaust: The prison Kauf is reminiscent of the concentration camps in the Holocaust, and the Warden is very similar to Dr. Mengele, a man famous for performing inhumane experiments on his prisoners during WWII. The mass killings of the Scholar race mirrors the genocide of the Jews.
Darwinism: Darwinism is the theory that nature weeds out the weak. The Commandant and Warden feel that they are obligated to weed out the weak by killing the Scholar race.
Essay:
Overview: Sabaa Tahir uses human history as a blueprint for her novel A Torch Against the Night.
The Stories We Love are the Stories We Know
A Torch Against the Night is the sequel to Sabaa Tahir’s debut novel, An Ember in the Ashes. The book follows Laia, Helene, and Elias as they fight for what they believe in. Throughout the novel, the author uses human history as the blueprint for her fantasy book. The book connects to the Roman Empire, Germany during WWII, and even societal beliefs like Darwinism that arose in the late 1800s.
The slavery depicted in this book and the slavery of the Roman Empire are very similar. In the Roman Empire slavery was a fundamental part of the economy. Slaves often had jobs that involved manual labor, but some had very technical jobs that required specific skills such as medicinal knowledge or steel working. In A Torch Against the Night, Laia’s family was mainly comprised of physicians before they were killed by the Commandant. The exceptions were her brother, who was involved in steel working, and herself, who was forced to become a maid after her brother was taken to Kauf. The way that the slaves were treated in the book parallels to that of the slaves of Ancient Rome. Slaves have never been treated with respect, and the slaves of the fictional Empire were no different. When Elias took Laia, Keenan, and Izzy through the streets of Nur he did so “with a confident disdain, barking out the occasional order”(146).
Like the similarities of the slavery of the Roman Empire and the slavery in A Torch Against the Night, the genocide of the Scholar race is reminiscent of the genocide of the Jews in the Holocaust. Throughout the duration of the book, the Commandant tries to eliminate the Scholar race. As well as hunting the Scholars and killing them, she gives the order to kill thousands of Scholar prisoners. Laia learns of this troubling news when a woman turns to her and says, “’The Martials are killing them… Every single prisoner’”(231). This is very similar to what happened in the Holocaust when the Nazis knew they didn’t have a chance of winning the war and they attempted to kill as many prisoners as possible. Meanwhile in Kauf, the sadistic Warden performed inhumane experiments on his Scholar prisoners. In the Holocaust, there was a man named Dr. Mengele who was famous for performing experiments like those of the Warden.
The mass killing of the Scholar race has undeniable similarities to the genocide of the Jews in WWII which was widely caused by a societal mindset today referred to as Darwinism. Darwinism is the belief that nature weeds out the weak. Most of the Martial race saw the Scholars as being subordinate. Even Helene, a protagonist, has skewed beliefs concerning the Scholars. “I’ve never seen the Scholars as enemies, exactly. An enemy is someone you fear. Someone who might destroy you. But the Scholars will never destroy the Martials. They can’t read. They can’t fight. They have no steelcraft. They are a slave class—a lesser class”(223). While most readers would agree that Helene is a good person, the way that she was raised caused her to have a distorted view on the Scholar race. Just like Helene, the Warden believed that the Martial race was superior, but he took his belief to a new level. Unfortunately for the prisoners of Kauf, he took this belief and twisted it into something that would accommodate his thirst for blood.“’Nature weeds out those who are lesser… I am no monster Elias. I am Nature’s assistant. A gardener of sorts. And I’m very handy with sheers’”(302). The Warden was an avid believer of Darwinism, even if he didn’t know it in the book.
A Torch Against the Night connects to various points in human history because all stories of substance are a part of one big story. Humans by nature are imperfect, and so the events that are engraved into our history books are stories filled with greed, superiority, and unnecessary death. Sabaa Tahir wrote this novel knowing that the events depicted in her book mirror events that readers are already familiar with. The familiarity that is felt throughout the book allows readers to connect with it better because they are able to understand what the characters are going through with very little narration from the author. Tahir’s uses of slavery, genocide, and Darwinism throughout the novel are all examples of human history being used to make the story more familiar, and therefore, more powerful.
The slavery depicted in this book and the slavery of the Roman Empire are very similar. In the Roman Empire slavery was a fundamental part of the economy. Slaves often had jobs that involved manual labor, but some had very technical jobs that required specific skills such as medicinal knowledge or steel working. In A Torch Against the Night, Laia’s family was mainly comprised of physicians before they were killed by the Commandant. The exceptions were her brother, who was involved in steel working, and herself, who was forced to become a maid after her brother was taken to Kauf. The way that the slaves were treated in the book parallels to that of the slaves of Ancient Rome. Slaves have never been treated with respect, and the slaves of the fictional Empire were no different. When Elias took Laia, Keenan, and Izzy through the streets of Nur he did so “with a confident disdain, barking out the occasional order”(146).
Like the similarities of the slavery of the Roman Empire and the slavery in A Torch Against the Night, the genocide of the Scholar race is reminiscent of the genocide of the Jews in the Holocaust. Throughout the duration of the book, the Commandant tries to eliminate the Scholar race. As well as hunting the Scholars and killing them, she gives the order to kill thousands of Scholar prisoners. Laia learns of this troubling news when a woman turns to her and says, “’The Martials are killing them… Every single prisoner’”(231). This is very similar to what happened in the Holocaust when the Nazis knew they didn’t have a chance of winning the war and they attempted to kill as many prisoners as possible. Meanwhile in Kauf, the sadistic Warden performed inhumane experiments on his Scholar prisoners. In the Holocaust, there was a man named Dr. Mengele who was famous for performing experiments like those of the Warden.
The mass killing of the Scholar race has undeniable similarities to the genocide of the Jews in WWII which was widely caused by a societal mindset today referred to as Darwinism. Darwinism is the belief that nature weeds out the weak. Most of the Martial race saw the Scholars as being subordinate. Even Helene, a protagonist, has skewed beliefs concerning the Scholars. “I’ve never seen the Scholars as enemies, exactly. An enemy is someone you fear. Someone who might destroy you. But the Scholars will never destroy the Martials. They can’t read. They can’t fight. They have no steelcraft. They are a slave class—a lesser class”(223). While most readers would agree that Helene is a good person, the way that she was raised caused her to have a distorted view on the Scholar race. Just like Helene, the Warden believed that the Martial race was superior, but he took his belief to a new level. Unfortunately for the prisoners of Kauf, he took this belief and twisted it into something that would accommodate his thirst for blood.“’Nature weeds out those who are lesser… I am no monster Elias. I am Nature’s assistant. A gardener of sorts. And I’m very handy with sheers’”(302). The Warden was an avid believer of Darwinism, even if he didn’t know it in the book.
A Torch Against the Night connects to various points in human history because all stories of substance are a part of one big story. Humans by nature are imperfect, and so the events that are engraved into our history books are stories filled with greed, superiority, and unnecessary death. Sabaa Tahir wrote this novel knowing that the events depicted in her book mirror events that readers are already familiar with. The familiarity that is felt throughout the book allows readers to connect with it better because they are able to understand what the characters are going through with very little narration from the author. Tahir’s uses of slavery, genocide, and Darwinism throughout the novel are all examples of human history being used to make the story more familiar, and therefore, more powerful.