Daughter of Fire - Rambling Readers

English language

Published 2024 by Amazon Publishing.

ISBN:: 978-1-6625-1797-6

(1 review)

For a young woman coming of age in sixteenth-century Guatemala, safeguarding her people’s legacy is a dangerous pursuit in a mystical, empowering, and richly imagined historical novel.

Catalina de Cerrato is being raised by her widowed father, Don Alonso, in 1551 Guatemala, scarcely thirty years since the Spanish invasion. A ruling member of the oppressive Spanish hierarchy, Don Alonso holds sway over the newly relegated lower class of Indigenous communities. Fiercely independent, Catalina struggles to honor her father and her late mother, a Maya noblewoman to whom Catalina made a vow that only she can keep: preserve the lost sacred text of the Popol Vuh, the treasured and now forbidden history of the K’iche’ people.

Urged on by her mother’s spirit voice, and possessing the gift of committing the invaluable stories to memory, Catalina embarks on a secret and transcendent quest to rewrite them. Through ancient pyramids, Spanish villas, and …

For a young woman coming of age in sixteenth-century Guatemala, safeguarding her people’s legacy is a dangerous pursuit in a mystical, empowering, and richly imagined historical novel.

Catalina de Cerrato is being raised by her widowed father, Don Alonso, in 1551 Guatemala, scarcely thirty years since the Spanish invasion. A ruling member of the oppressive Spanish hierarchy, Don Alonso holds sway over the newly relegated lower class of Indigenous communities. Fiercely independent, Catalina struggles to honor her father and her late mother, a Maya noblewoman to whom Catalina made a vow that only she can keep: preserve the lost sacred text of the Popol Vuh, the treasured and now forbidden history of the K’iche’ people.

Urged on by her mother’s spirit voice, and possessing the gift of committing the invaluable stories to memory, Catalina embarks on a secret and transcendent quest to rewrite them. Through ancient pyramids, Spanish villas, and caves of masked devils, she finds an ally in the captivating Juan de Rojas, a lord whose rule was compromised by the invasion. But as their love and trust unfold, and Don Alonso’s tyranny escalates, Catalina must confront her conflicted blood heritage―and its secrets―once and for all if she’s to follow her dangerous quest to its historic end.

1 edition

Jules reviewed Daughter of Fire by Sofia Robleda

Fascinating historical fiction

4 stars

This was a fascinating book and very different from what I was expecting. For a start it's a historical novel set in the real world, in which ancient curses work and characters are visited by visions of their ancestors and deities, but it's far too realistic to be classified as magical realism. Perhaps because they are based on real figures, characters are complex and don't fall into neat narrative categories. Don Alonso is a harsh domestic tyrant who came closest of any of the conquistadors to recognise the humanity of the people he ruled over. Catalina struggles to reconcile the two sides of her heritage as a descendant of both colonisers and the people they almost eradicated, makes mistakes and occasional selfish decisions, often as a result of the way the society in which she is raised denies women agency.

I initially thought the book was leaning into the historical …

This was a fascinating book and very different from what I was expecting. For a start it's a historical novel set in the real world, in which ancient curses work and characters are visited by visions of their ancestors and deities, but it's far too realistic to be classified as magical realism. Perhaps because they are based on real figures, characters are complex and don't fall into neat narrative categories. Don Alonso is a harsh domestic tyrant who came closest of any of the conquistadors to recognise the humanity of the people he ruled over. Catalina struggles to reconcile the two sides of her heritage as a descendant of both colonisers and the people they almost eradicated, makes mistakes and occasional selfish decisions, often as a result of the way the society in which she is raised denies women agency.

I initially thought the book was leaning into the historical fiction trope of the love triangle, which then became a love square I suppose as another eligible male candidate presented himself, but refreshingly this then took a very unexpected turn and none of the characters behaved in stereotypical ways. Peoples' reactions to events felt very flawed and real. For me I think part of the appeal of fiction is that in a harsh and unfair world we can imagine things being better, and for that reason I found it a little unsatisfying how often sad situations occurred and close relationships were not mended because people couldn't trust and open up to one another, but that undeniably adds to the realism. It was refreshing too to see a more realistic depiction of people experiencing guilt, trauma and acquiring disabilities as a result of awful events, rather than carrying on as so often happens in escapist fiction.

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Central America