Save The Pearls is a two-book young-adult series written by American author Victoria Foyt, about a post-apocalyptic dystopian future in which black people have taken over and white people are a persecuted minority. The first book in the series,
Revealing Eden, was published in 2012. The second book,
Adapting Eden, was published in 2013.
This series provides examples of:
- After the End: A massive solar flare has caused the collapse of civilization.
- Albinos Are Freaks: "Cottons" (the term for albinos) are threatened with being killed on sight in this dystopian future.
- Artistic License – Biology: In the post-apocalyptic world in which the books take place, the Coals have become the majority because they have more melanin, and thus have more resistance to the sun, and an innate resistance to skin cancer ("the heat"). While it's true that darker skin does give increased protection from the sun, the author tends to treat it as a blanket immunity, which is an unfortunate misconception that in real life has led to preventable deaths, since there are been cases where skin cancer isn't recognized as early in dark-skinned people as it likely would have been in people with light skin.
- Artistic License – Religion: The Huaorani tribe is shown worshiping warped versions of the Aztec gods (see Sadly Mythtaken below), when in real life the Huaorani practiced shamanism and animism rather than worshiping specific deities. Also, it's highly unlikely that an Ecuadorian tribe is going to be worshiping gods from an ancient Mexican and Central American nation.
- Blackface: Because of the prejudice against them, the Pearls resort to wearing blackface in public in order to try and fit in. At one point, the reader is told about a minstrel show wherein the performers wear "white face".
- But Not Too White: It's far in the future, blacks are on top culturally, whites are on the bottom, and as a result, the standards of beauty lean black.
- A Dog Named "Cat": Bramford is hailed by an Ecuadorian tribe of Native Americans as a jaguar god called "El Tigre", which is Spanish for "the tiger".
- Food Pills: The entire population seems to subsist on carbohydrate, protein, and fat pills. No mention is made of vitamin pills, so why all the characters aren't dead of scurvy is anyone's guess.
- Government Drug Enforcement: Everyone has a ration of "oxy" (oxycontin) that they take via "oxy-caps", helmets that insert a needle into a shunt on the back of their necks. Where all the poppies used to make the oxy come from is not discussed, nor how an entire society of opioid addicts manages to operate.
- Gratuitous Spanish: Courtesy of the native tribe, reading like it came straight off of Google Translate.
- Hollywood Science: The premise relies heavily upon a poor understanding of how things like solar radiation, and gene splicing work.
- Latino Is Brown: Latinos are referred to as "Tiger's Eyes" and it's abundantly clear that the author thinks that all Latinos constitute a single race. In reality, Latinos come in many different phenotypes, and many would be too light or too dark for such a name to make sense.
- Mate or Die: Women who have not found a mate by the time they turn 18 are cut off from all supplies. (Men have until they turn 24.)
- Mayincatec: Somehow the Aztecs and an Ecuadorian tribe live side by side in this setting, despite both cultures being separated by thousands of miles in real life. The stone terraces built by the Inca make an appearance but are credited to the Aztecs.
- Minstrel Shows: They exist in this universe, but since whites are the ones who get discriminated against, the performers wear whiteface and act as racist parodies of white people.
- Persecution Flip: In the post-apocalyptic future presented in the books, the white minority ("Pearls") are oppressed by the black majority ("Coals") after ozone depletion kills off people with low melanin. The pearls have to wear blackface in public. The author, incidentally, is white.
- Politically Incorrect Hero: Being the main heroine doesn't stop Eden from hating black people.
- Preppy Name: Ronson Bramford is a wealthy businessman with a very upper-class sounding name.
- Sadly Mythtaken: Aztec Mythology gets properly butchered in this book. Bramford is hailed by the native tribe as "El Tigre," the jaguar god prophesied to return to rule again. Ignoring the fact that it's unlikely that a South American tribe would call their jaguar god "the tiger", the Aztec god associated with the jaguar was actually called Tezcatlipoca, while the Aztec god prophesied to return again was Quetzalcoatl. Likewise, a snake goddess from Aztec mythology, Coatlicue, is appropriated as the Huaorani guardian of the afterlife, when Coatlicue was actually a mother goddess in the original mythology.
- Where da White Women At?: Inverted. "Pearls" are the ones chasing "Coals" to marry, and apparently, they're kicked out of society if they are not "mated" by 18. Strangely, it's never really explained why the white people don't just reproduce with each other or why they're ejected at 18 if they're not married. It creates strange contradictions like Eden calling for Pearl equality and independence but practically throwing up at the idea of mating with one of her own.
