[3] The Tamil version is dedicated to R. Ilavarasan, a young Dalit man who was discovered dead on a railway track after his inter-caste marriage had brought about violence from his community.

As days pass by, Saroja has to put up with Marayi's constant insults and the village folks' questions and comments about her caste.

Kumarasen worked in a soda-bottle packing and distributing unit for Soda Bottle Bhai and was Saroja's neighbor.

Kumarasen has to leave the village for a couple of days to visit his shop but Saroja urges him to come back at night however late it is.

That night, Saroja goes to the bushes near the rock to defecate and overhears Marayi conspiring with other villagers to kill her in Kumaresan's absence.

A devastating tale of innocent young love pitted against chilling savagery, Pyre conjures a terrifying vision of intolerance.

[9] Throughout the story, Saroja and Kumaresan have to face caste-based humiliations in the form of fiery words and dehumanising physical abuse.

[11] The inter-caste marriage becomes a reason for defilement of the caste purity of the entire village from which, therefore, Kumaresan and his family is boycotted.

[7] Reviewers have also pointed out the rich evocation of the Kongu land in the story, accepting that Murugan's "eloquent' language and "razor-sharp metaphors" bring nature to life in the village scenes,[11][12] especially with paragraphs like: One review, however, criticizes the representation of country life as bland, something that Murugan has painted as "alien and exotic" in order to engage the reader who has never been to rural India.