The only daughter of the kingdom of Kekaya, she is raised on tales about the might and benevolence of the gods: how they churned the vast ocean to obtain the nectar of immortality, how they vanquish evil and ensure the land of Bharat prospers, and how they offer powerful boons to the devout and the wise. Yet she watches as her father unceremoniously banishes her mother, listens as her own worth is reduced to how great a marriage alliance she can secure. And when she calls upon the gods for help, they never seem to hear.Desperate for some measure of independence, she turns to the texts she once read with her mother and discovers a magic that is hers alone. With this power, Kaikeyi transforms herself from an overlooked princess into a warrior, diplomat, and most favored queen, determined to carve a better world for herself and the women around her.But as the evil from her childhood stories threatens the cosmic order, the path she has forged clashes with the destiny the gods have chosen for her family. And Kaikeyi must decide if resistance is worth the destruction it will wreak—and what legacy she intends to leave behind.A stunning debut from a powerful new voice, Kaikeyi is a tale of fate, family, courage, and heartbreak—of an extraordinary woman determined to leave her mark in a world where gods and men dictate the shape of things to come.

    There are few triumphs in my recent life, but I count this as one. My existence of the last three years has been nothing but incident.”The Year is 1883 and Emma M. Lion has returned to her London neighborhood of St. Crispian’s. But Emma’s plans for a charmed and studious life are sabotaged by her eccentric Cousin Archibald, her formidable Aunt Eugenia, and the slightly odd denizens of St. Crispian’s.Emma M. Lion offers up her Unselected Journals, however self-incriminating they may be, which comprise a series of novella-length volumes. Armed with wit and a sideways amusement, Emma documents the curious realities of her life at Lapis Lazuli House.

    She grows up in the wild, in a cave with her mother, but visions of a faraway lake come to her on the spring breeze, and when she hears a traveler speak of Artos, king of Caer Leon, she knows that her future lies at his court.And so, brimming with magic and eager to test her strength, she breaks her covenant with her mother and, with a broken hunting spear and mended armour, rides on a bony gelding to Caer Leon. On her adventures she will meet great knights and steal the hearts of beautiful women. She will fight warriors and sorcerers. And she will find her love, and the lake, and her fate.

    The first book follows a teen girl who must guard the key to the source of her nation's magic, and the orphan-turned-assassin whose future depends on him taking it from her. Publication is slated for spring 2021; Pete Knapp at Park & Fine Literary and Media negotiated the deal for North American rights.

    In every world, it was a kind of magic.“No maids, no funny talking, no fainting flowers.” Luli Wei is beautiful, talented, and desperate to be a star. Coming of age in pre-Code Hollywood, she knows how dangerous the movie business is and how limited the roles are for a Chinese American girl from Hungarian Hill—but she doesn’t care. She’d rather play a monster than a maid.But in Luli’s world, the worst monsters in Hollywood are not the ones on screen. The studios want to own everything from her face to her name to the women she loves, and they run on a system of bargains made in blood and ancient magic, powered by the endless sacrifice of unlucky starlets like her. For those who do survive to earn their fame, success comes with a steep price. Luli is willing to do whatever it takes—even if that means becoming the monster herself.Siren Queen offers up an enthralling exploration of an outsider achieving stardom on her own terms, in a fantastical Hollywood where the monsters are real and the magic of the silver screen illuminates every page.

    Valente.A gruesome curse. A city in upheaval. A monster with unquenchable appetites. Marlinchen and her two sisters live with their wizard father in a city shifting from magic to industry. As Oblya’s last true witches, she and her sisters are little more than a tourist trap as they treat their clients with archaic remedies and beguile them with nostalgic charm. Marlinchen spends her days divining secrets in exchange for rubles and trying to placate her tyrannical, xenophobic father, who keeps his daughters sequestered from the outside world. But at night, Marlinchen and her sisters sneak out to enjoy the city’s amenities and revel in its thrills, particularly the recently established ballet theater, where Marlinchen meets a dancer who quickly captures her heart. As Marlinchen’s late-night trysts grow more fervent and frequent, so does the threat of her father’s rage and magic. And while Oblya flourishes with culture and bustles with enterprise, a monster lurks in its midst, borne of intolerance and resentment and suffused with old-world power. Caught between history and progress and blood and desire, Marlinchen must draw upon her own magic to keep her city safe and find her place within it.

    All her life, Jani has dreamed of Elsewhere. Just barely scraping by with her job at a tannery, she’s resigned to a dreary life in the port town of Durc, caring for her younger sister Zosa. That is, until the Hotel Magnifique comes to town. The hotel is legendary not only for its whimsical enchantments, but also for its ability to travel—appearing in a different destination every morning. While Jani and Zosa can’t afford the exorbitant costs of a guest’s stay, they can interview to join the staff, and are soon whisked away on the greatest adventure of their lives. But once inside, Jani quickly discovers their contracts are unbreakable and that beneath the marvelous glamour, the hotel is hiding dangerous secrets. With the vexingly handsome doorman Bel as her only ally, Jani embarks on a mission to unravel the mystery of the magic at the heart of the hotel and free Zosa—and the other staff—from the cruelty of the ruthless maître d’hôtel. To succeed, she’ll have to risk everything she loves, but failure would mean a fate far worse than never returning home.

    The novel follows a gang of outcasts in a deadly heist led by Arthie Casimir to save her tearoom—which fronts an illegal blood house, where local vampires can purchase fresh blood. Publication of the first novel is set for Fall 2022; Josh Adams at Adams Literary did the two-book deal for world English rights.

    A boy, greatness. A girl, nothingness…In 1345, China lies under harsh Mongol rule. For the starving peasants of the Central Plains, greatness is something found only in stories. When the Zhu family’s eighth-born son, Zhu Chongba, is given a fate of greatness, everyone is mystified as to how it will come to pass. The fate of nothingness received by the family’s clever and capable second daughter, on the other hand, is only as expected.When a bandit attack orphans the two children, though, it is Zhu Chongba who succumbs to despair and dies. Desperate to escape her own fated death, the girl uses her brother's identity to enter a monastery as a young male novice. There, propelled by her burning desire to survive, Zhu learns she is capable of doing whatever it takes, no matter how callous, to stay hidden from her fate.After her sanctuary is destroyed for supporting the rebellion against Mongol rule, Zhu uses takes the chance to claim another future altogether: her brother's abandoned greatness.

    But this version of 1950's America is characterized by a significant event: The Mass Dragoning of 1955, when hundreds of thousands of ordinary wives and mothers sprouted wings, scales and talons, left a trail of fiery destruction in their path, and took to the skies. Seemingly for good. Was it their choice? What will become of those left behind? Why did Alex's beloved Aunt Marla transform but her mother did not? Alex doesn't know. It's taboo to speak of, even more so than her crush on Sonja, her schoolmate.Forced into silence, Alex nevertheless must face the consequences of dragons: a mother more protective than ever; a father growing increasingly distant; the upsetting insistence that her aunt never even existed; and a new "sister" obsessed with dragons far beyond propriety. Through loss, rage, and self-discovery, this story follows Alex's journey as she deals with the events leading up to and beyond the Mass Dragoning, and her connection with the phenomenon itself.

    Can they reconcile their differences when their worlds are so very changed by the societal gap which divides them?And when emotions run high, the spirits of The Valiard Mansion stir.THE VALIARD MANSION is an illustrated novel set in 1888. It tells the story of two childhood sweethearts separated by a vengeful ghost. The novel's first two chaptes can be read for free to download today! Visit http://www.thevaliardmansion.com/

    1828. Robin Swift, orphaned by cholera in Canton, is brought to London by the mysterious Professor Lovell. There, he trains for years in Latin, Ancient Greek, and Chinese, all in preparation for the day he'll enroll in Oxford University's prestigious Royal Institute of Translation — also known as Babel. Babel is the world's center of translation and, more importantly, of silver-working: the art of manifesting the meaning lost in translation through enchanted silver bars, to magical effect. Silver-working has made the British Empire unparalleled in power, and Babel's research in foreign languages serves the Empire's quest to colonize everything it encounters.Oxford, the city of dreaming spires, is a fairytale for Robin; a utopia dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge. But knowledge serves power, and for Robin, a Chinese boy raised in Britain, serving Babel inevitably means betraying his motherland. As his studies progress Robin finds himself caught between Babel and the shadowy Hermes Society, an organization dedicated to sabotaging the silver-working that supports imperial expansion. When Britain pursues an unjust war with China over silver and opium, Robin must decide: Can powerful institutions be changed from within, or does revolution always require violence? What is he willing to sacrifice to bring Babel down? Babel — a thematic response to The Secret History and a tonal response to Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell — grapples with student revolutions, colonial resistance, and the use of translation as a tool of empire.

    The Manhattan School for Magic is the newest kindling school in New York, but Maeve O’Donnell knows she doesn't deserve her place there. Though her sister, Izzy, is one of the school's founders and a hero to those who can now kindle, Maeve can't control her magic and she lives in fear of anyone—especially Izzy—finding out.When Maeve’s worst fears come true and her magic goes rogue, it damages not only the new school but Izzy’s reputation as well. While trying to repair what she’s broken, Maeve discovers a mysterious garden in the tenement neighborhood of the Tarnish, a hidden place where her magic actually works. As her magic and confidence grow, she befriends the others for whom the garden is a haven: a litter of talking kittens (house dragons, of course) who need Maeve’s help to find their missing mother. But someone else is searching for the kittens, too, someone who doesn’t care how many magical sites they have to destroy to stop magic’s expansion. And Maeve’s unstable magic might be the only way to save her sister’s school from being snuffed out next.The Tarnished Garden is a sparkling middle-grade novel from Alyssa Colman.

    I transmigrated inside the novel of my favorite character, the second male lead.A tsundere who listens to all the words of the female lead while grunting, with a straight forward personality, and a handsome face.Matching all my preferences, he was even single after the ending.Nice! I’ll pick up the second male lead!However, I overlooked one thing…The tsundere, who had been abandoned by the female lead blackened, and had become a terrifying man!“Get lost.”…I-Is it safe for me to pick up the second male lead?

    Or so Liena thought…Magical visions have a way of turning the world upside-down. One minute Song Liena is a simple farm girl hoping for good luck at the matchmaker, and the next she is a student at the empire’s most rigorous and dangerous magic Academy.It doesn’t take long for her to realize she’s ten years behind, her magic is weak, and she is in way over her head. But Liena is determined to work hard if it means a chance at a better life for her family.She just wasn’t counting on being noticed by the handsome Crown Prince—a warrior-in-training said to have fire magic powerful enough to decimate entire armies. But princes are not for peasants, and everything is not as it seems at the Academy. Monsters lurk around every corner, and someone is dabbling in dark, illegal magic.Someone who has set their sinister sights on her.

    Four hundred years apart, they're bound by a common mission to rescue our world, aided by the mysterious presence of the mounds. Thousands of these ancient earthworks once dotted the landscape of North America. We still don't know why they were created. Sacred Mounds suggests they are as important today as when they were made over a thousand years ago.Sacred Mounds, a first novel of magical realism and historical fantasy, weaves the stories of two men, each a stranger in a strange land. With the help of two remarkable women, they must find a way to save our planet and return home.From Jim Metzner, producer of the Pulse of the Planet series and podcast, with a foreword by Hutke Fields, principal chief of the Natchez Nation.

    Despite his best efforts using an incredible power, she is no longer among the living.When a rival kingdom seeks to take advantage of this delicate time in Drygo’s life, he is thrust into a battle for the future of his kingdom.Can he save his people where he could not save his queen?Fans of R.A. Salvatore, Brandon Sanderson, and Patrick Rothfuss, will love this epic sword and sorcery adventure.Ash and Steel is a short story introducing the world of Soul Stones, an upcoming epic fantasy series. It can be read as a standalone or as part of the series.

    Why is it we help in times of crisis? We have a gift. We are stronger than Mundanes, plain and simple.At the dawn of their adolescence, on the eve of the summer solstice, four young girls--Helena, Leonie, Niamh and Elle--took the oath to join Her Majesty's Royal Coven, established by Queen Elizabeth I as a covert government department. Now, decades later, the witch community is still reeling from a civil war and Helena is now the reigning High Priestess of the organization. Yet Helena is the only one of her friend group still enmeshed in the stale bureaucracy of HMRC. Elle is trying to pretend she's a normal housewife, and Niamh has become a country vet, using her powers to heal sick animals. In what Helena perceives as the deepest betrayal, Leonie has defected to start her own more inclusive and intersectional coven, Diaspora. And now Helena has a bigger problem. A young warlock of extraordinary capabilities has been captured by authorities and seems to threaten the very existence of HMRC. With conflicting beliefs over the best course of action, the four friends must decide where their loyalties lie: with preserving tradition, or doing what is right.Juno Dawson explores gender and the corrupting nature of power in a delightful and provocative story of magic and matriarchy, friendship and feminism. Dealing with all the aspects of contemporary womanhood, as well as being phenomenally powerful witches, Niamh, Helena, Leonie and Elle may have grown apart but they will always be bound by the sisterhood of the coven.

    She fought for love.Achilles has fled her home and her vicious Myrmidon clan to live as a woman with the kallai, the transgender priestesses of Great Mother Aphrodite. When Odysseus comes to recruit the “prince” Achilles for a war against the Hittites, she prepares to die rather than fight as a man. However, her divine mother, Athena, intervenes, transforming her body into the woman’s body she always longed for, and promises her everything: glory, power, fame, victory in war, and, most importantly, a child born of her own body. Reunited with her beloved cousin, Patroklos, and his brilliant wife, the sorceress Meryapi, Achilles sets out to war with a vengeance. But the gods—a dysfunctional family of abusive immortals that have glutted on human sacrifices for centuries—have woven ancient schemes more blood-soaked and nightmarish than Achilles can imagine. At the center of it all is the cruel, immortal Helen, who sees Achilles as a worthy enemy after millennia of ennui and emptiness. In love with her newfound nemesis, Helen sets out to destroy everything and everyone Achilles cherishes, seeking a battle to the death. An innovative spin on a familiar tale, this is the Trojan War unlike anything ever told, and an Achilles whose vulnerability is revealed by the people she chooses to fight…and chooses to trust.

    In doing so, she creates her own monster in the form of her scientist son, Victor, whose obsession with conquering death leads to forbidden realms. The BetrothedRescued by Caroline as a four-year-old beggar, angelic Elizabeth Lavenza understands the only way she can repay the Frankensteins is by accepting Victor’s hand in marriage. But when Elizabeth’s heart yearns for someone else, the lives of those she most loves collide with the unnatural creature born of Victor’s profane experiments.The ServantAfter an abusive childhood, otherworldly Justine Moreau is taken in by Caroline to serve the Frankensteins. Justine’s devotion to Caroline and Elizabeth knows no bounds … until a family tragedy changes her irrevocably. Her fate sets her against Victor’s monster, who is desperate for a mate—and desperate to wreak revenge against the Frankensteins. Stunningly written and exquisitely atmospheric, Unnatural Creatures shocks new life into Mary Shelley’s beloved gothic classic by revealing the feminine side of the tale. You’ll never see Victor Frankenstein and his monster the same way again.

    Bound to the Queen of Chandela through a forbidden soul bond that saved her when she was a child, Katyani has grown up in the royal family and become the best guardswoman the Garuda has ever seen. But when a series of assassination attempts threatens the royals, Katyani is shipped off to the gurukul of the famous Acharya Mahavir as an escort to Ayan and his cousin, Bhairav, to protect them as they hone the skills needed to be the next leaders of the kingdom. Nothing could annoy Katyani more than being stuck in a monastic school in the middle of a forest, except her run-ins with Daksh, the Acharya’s son, who can’t stop going on about the rules and whose gaze makes her feel like he can see into her soul.But when Katyani and the princes are hurriedly summoned back to Chandela before their training is complete, tragedy strikes and Katyani is torn from the only life she has ever known. Alone and betrayed in a land infested by monsters, Katyani must find answers from her past to save all she loves and forge her own destiny. Bonds can be broken, but debts must be repaid.

    Abandoned by his parents at birth, he was raised as a lowborn and subjected to the noblefolk's injustice. Moreover, he was a dragonrider with a dream to become a paladin. In the corrupt Sovereign Empire of the Otherworld, that's too much for a lowborn to dream of. But during a stay at London in the World-side, he is assigned to bring an orphaned girl named Shelly back to her family in the Otherworld. Upon their return, he finds his country in a state of fear. A renegade black magician named Tess'lah has risen from the dead and she will not stop until she crumbles the Empire. Though Jack's attempt to reunite Shelly with her family is partly a success, things turn sour when he enters his next quest at the Magical Assets Division. A relic to rule the world lies at stake. Jack must prevent it from falling into evil hands of Tess'lah. The only people who can stop it while are Jack and his foster-brother wizard with a snarky apprentice.Unexpectedly, Jack and Shelly cross their paths again. But this time, Shelly is on a quest of survival. She falls victim to the injustice of the nobles and the only person who can save her is Jack. Finally, Jack feels like a real knight. But when Jack discovers a well-guarded secret that could change the fate of both worlds, he's forced to make daring choices between honor and justice, knighthood and treason--and above all, love and life. Will Jack survive this perilous quest?The Dragon Girl has risen, and with her begins the War of Steel and Magic.

    He is also beloved of the ancient Italic goddess Angitia, which makes him the perfect person to recover a strange weapon the Nazis are planning to use against the Allies in the battle of Montecassino.

    Those dragons all disappeared from Japan after World War II, and twenty years later, they've become the stuff of legend. Their smaller cousins, who can fit in your palm, are all that remain. And Kohei loves his ryū, Yuharu, but......Kohei has a memory of the big ryū. He knows that's impossible, but still, it's there, in his mind. In it, he can see his grandpa – Ojiisan – gazing up at the big ryū with what looks to Kohei like total and absolute wonder. When Kohei was little, he dreamed he'd go on a grand quest to bring the big ryū back, to get Ojiisan to smile again.But now, Ojiisan is really, really sick. And Kohei is running out of time.Kohei needs to find the big ryū now, before it's too late. With the help of Isolde, his new half-Jewish, half-Japanese neighbor; and Isolde's Yiddish-speaking dragon, Cheshire; he thinks he can do it. Maybe. He doesn't have a choice.In The Lost Ryū, debut author Emi Watanabe Cohen gives us a story of multigenerational pain, magic, and the lengths we'll go to protect the people we love.

    An “unbreakable” Japanese naval code. A pilot on a top-secret mission that could change the course of WWII. The Codebreaker's Secret is a dazzling story of love and intrigue set during America’s darkest hour.1943. As war in the Pacific rages on, Isabel Cooper and her codebreaker colleagues huddle in “the dungeon” at Station HYPO in Pearl Harbor, deciphering secrets plucked from the airwaves in a race to bring down the enemy. Isabel has only one wish: to avenge her brother’s death. But she soon finds life has other plans when she meets his best friend, a hotshot pilot with secrets of his own.1965. Fledgling journalist Lu Freitas comes home to Hawai'i to cover the grand opening of the glamorous Mauna Kea Beach Hotel, Rockefeller's newest and grandest project. When a high-profile guest goes missing, Lu forms an unlikely alliance with an intimidating veteran photographer to unravel the mystery. The two make a shocking discovery that stirs up memories and uncovers an explosive secret from the war days. A secret that only a codebreaker can crack."Sara Ackerman never disappoints!" ­—Kate Quinn, New York Times bestselling author of The Rose Code“A wow of a book… A captivating story of friendship, heartbreak and true love. Highly recommend!” —Karen Robards, New York Times bestselling author of The Black Swan of Paris, on Radar Girls

    A lonely soul, which was placed under the care of the Lord Protector’s Manor, ended up having her lover stolen by the family’s eldest daughter and dying tragically the day before her wedding.Somehow, she was reborn in the family as their 14-year-old first wife’s daughter, Ning Xueyan, with a startlingly familiar face.Step by step, she will ruthlessly scheme to seek revenge as well as uncover the mystery of her tragic death.Her former fiancee, the flirty crown prince and the bloodthirsty prince, will now bear witness to a vengeful Ning Xueyan becoming the peerless lady of her generation…

    Chakraborty's next series, a historical fantasy pitched as Sinbad the Sailor meets Oceans 11 wherein an infamous, retired pirate gets pulled back into the game when she's offered to right a wrong from her past and score a fabled treasure, but assembling her old crew and outwitting a ruthless ex-Crusader aren't her only problems, because she's learned the hard way the fantastical legends behind such treasures hold deadly truths, and they're coming for her, to David Pomerico at Voyager, in a major deal, in a three-book deal, for publication in spring 2022.

    He is wulfhedinn, wolf demon-scourge of the Christian Franks. He is also Gerwulf, the man, a scorned outcast and bastard of a Christian woman and pagan father. Gerwulf emerges from the shadows to escape his demons and seek deliverance. To save his mortal soul, he battles for God, serving the legendary Charlemagne in a savage Holy War against the pagan Saxons. His journey leads to his greatest battle-reclaiming humanity in a dark age when beasts lurk inside all men. ...and the Raven Te Eater of Souls She soars above Hungering to feast on the bloodguilt of all...

    M. Miro's Ordinary Monsters introduces readers to the dark, labyrinthe world of The TalentsEngland, 1882. In Victorian London, two children with mysterious powers are hunted by a figure of darkness —a man made of smoke.Sixteen-year-old Charlie Ovid, despite a lifetime of brutality, doesn't have a scar on him. His body heals itself, whether he wants it to or not. Marlowe, a foundling from a railway freight car, shines with a strange bluish light. He can melt or mend flesh. When two grizzled detectives are recruited to escort them north to safety, they are forced to confront the nature of difference, and belonging, and the shadowy edges of the monstrous.What follows is a journey from the gaslit streets of London, to an eerie estate outside Edinburgh, where other children with gifts—the Talents—have been gathered. Here, the world of the dead and the world of the living threaten to collide. And as secrets within the Institute unfurl, Marlowe, Charlie and the rest of the Talents will discover the truth about their abilities, and the nature of the force that is stalking them: that the worst monsters sometimes come bearing the sweetest gifts.With lush prose, mesmerizing world-building, and a gripping plot, Ordinary Monsters presents a catastophic vision of the Victorian world—and of the gifted, broken children who must save it.

    When he sees his crush attacked in the street by an outraged ex-client, it seems it’s finally Nikias’s chance to be the hero.Kallion doesn’t need a rescue. What he really needs is a skewer of octopus fritters (with extra sauce) and a friend. Nikias can supply both, and maybe, with the help of Nikias’s skill in the kitchen and Kallion’s excellent collection of wine, they can fight past their misunderstandings and the disasters of their pasts to something deeper.But when civil unrest roils the city and old threats resurface, the trust these two have built will be tested. And they’d both better hope that Kallion’s vicious former master will just stay dead.Honey & Pepper is a standalone m/m romance and also the first book in the When in Pheme series set in an imaginary ancient world.