Blood Bound

The magical Blight destroying Astrid’s homeland of Arturea is an allegory for the modern climate crisis, in which global warming and the loss of tree cover is leading to dangerous environmental events such as extreme weather, melting glaciers, flash floods, landslides, and drought. A 2026 report argues that the global rise of ecological disasters is directly linked to the burning of fossil fuels and is bound to accelerate (Carrington, Damien. “‘Jaw-dropping’ El Niño bursts through temperature record months before peak.” The Guardian, 2026). 

Fantasy literature has a long history of using magical plagues or environmental decay to comment on these real-world ecological issues. In Blood Bound, the Blight manifests as extreme weather, failing crops, and environmental collapse, mirroring the effects of real-world global warming. The ecological crisis in the novel is driven by the hoarding of the Heart’s magical energy by the kingdom of Vatra, which is an allegory for the link between climate change and capitalist systems. 

Environmentalists, journalists, and thinkers have long argued that the capitalistic economic model—driven by profit rather than the sharing of resources—only worsens the environmental crisis, with big corporations contributing the most to fossil fuel emissions (Watts, Jonathan. “Just 57 companies linked to 80% of greenhouse gas emissions since 2016.” The Guardian, 2024). In her book, This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate, writer and climate activist Naomi Klein argues that the world needs to find a new way to share resources in order to survive: “Climate change is a […] powerful message—spoken in the language of fires, floods, droughts, and extinctions—telling us that we need an entirely new economic model and a new way of sharing this planet” (Klein, Naomi. This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate. Simon & Schuster, New York, 2014).  

The social consequences of the paucity of magical energy in the novel also have a real-world parallel. In the novel, the elites live in luxury, enjoying air conditioning and heat, while the economically weaker classes struggle to afford enough electricity to warm their food. A 2023 report from several international agencies including the IEA and the UN noted that “675 million people were without electricity in 2021” (“Basic Energy Access Lags Amid Renewable Opportunities, New Report Shows.” International Energy Agency, 2023), a phenomenon known as energy poverty. By framing the Blight as a result of systemic greed and unequal resource distribution, the authors use the fantasy setting to critique the real-world structures exacerbating the climate crisis and its disproportionate impact on vulnerable populations.