Teach The Torches To Burn by Caleb Roehrig Book Review

A gay Romeo & Juliet sort of tale? Has been done before, and that shouldn’t be surprising. The very theme of forbidden love is incredibly relatable for anyone in the LGBTQ+ community. And yet, it shouldn’t really matter if something’s a bit familiar if you can speed through it easy peasy.

Without spoiling too much (okay, spoiling a little), Teach The Torches To Burn, to my surprise, has the same characters with the same names as the original play, just like it takes place in Verona and has the never-ending Montague-Capulet feud. This Romeo loves painting and gardening and has a very dim relationship with his father, who feels he is not exhibiting traits his next-in-line should have. Benvolio and Mercutio are always on Romeo to go out and find someone to maybe hook up with like Benvolio always does.

When Romeo does go there, he actually does meet a couple people. Two. One is Valentine, a guy who’s the younger brother of one of his closest friends. And a girl. Who he can easily talk to. Who is okay with him trespassing on the Capulet land. Who feels change needs to happen and that Tybalt is nothing but a smug, delicate troublemaker. Who could this girl be?

When Romeo and Valentine realize they have mutual feelings of attraction towards one another, all hell breaks loose due to those in the Capulet family who wish to see Romeo slain, and with the help of their new friends who are sympathetic, the two lover boys will have to figure out a path toward a life together and escaping a serious charge, which you’ll be familiar with if you know the play.

So, years ago I read Juliet Immortal by Stacey Jay, a Romeo and Juliet sort-of sequel with fantastical twist-ups, and its extremely slow pace and weak romance left me disappointed. And while Shakespearean language can be enjoyable in small verses, it can be easily annoying when it sometimes becomes indecipherable without pausing to look it up, or if it’s too long. So I’m sometimes hesitant about Shakespeare retellings in general. Teach The Torches To Burn has some fine detail about the gardens, the lakes, the castles of Verona, but almost never to the point of over-exposition. The language never really feels pretentious. It’s more interested in telling Romeo’s story as a lonely, lovestruck and life-trapped teen.

Even though the same names are here, we find out early on that this is not the exact same story we remember, and not just because it has the gay treatment. Characters we know do some unexpected choices, and others don’t meet the same fate as expected. We quickly realize in this story, anything’s possible, and it’s refreshingly not following the algorithm precisely.

Not to mention I loved this new rendition of Juliet. I couldn’t help but feel the original Juliet would have completely approved of her tenacity, understanding, and willingness to think for herself and support Romeo as a simple close friend. Pretty much every character here that we’re familiar with already gets a more authenticated version of themselves in this retelling, one of many things that keeps the ball rolling.

Teach The Torches To Burn is a lovely success, romantic and sad without undermining the tension necessary for this story to work, especially since we all know this is a retelling of a tragedy. We end up actually caring about the versions of these characters more than the original renditions.

4 and a half stars out of 5