Tor.com has revealed the cover of my upcoming book Fireheart Tiger, an f/f postcolonial The Goblin Emperor meets Howl’s Moving Castle. Look at it, isn’t it amazing?

Cover art by Alyssa Winans

Some small details you might not have noticed:

• the dragon on the pillar behind the woman (the flag of the country in the story is the dragon and pearl)
  the object catching fire in her hand is a teacup, referring to a story scene
  the guns in the lower right-hand corner, both propping up and threatening the palace
  the pavilion in the gardens, a crucial story location
  the markings on her skin near the flame evoke a tiger’s skin
  the large building in her sleeves is Cửa Ngọ Môn, the Noon Gate in the imperial citadel in Huế. The fact that she’s transporting things in her sleeves is a reference to Vietnamese (and Chinese) garments having sleeves large enough to be used as pockets

You’ll be wondering why the title: it refers to a Vietnamese folk tale about how the tiger got his stripes: they’re the marks of a rope when man burnt him with fire, and explains that the resentful tiger now seeks to eat men. I took the fire, the tiger and the idea of imprisonment, and ran with it.

And here’s the official summary

The book will be out Feb 9th 2021.

You can preorder now—a small reminder that preorders help books a lot, because they indicate enthusiasm, and that in turn influences visibility and thus the attention given to the book (and many many thanks to everyone who’s already preordered, you rock).

Out today!

Dragons, court drama and relationships…

An unlikely duo of a bookish dragon prince and his ruthless Fallen angel husband have to cooperate with each other to navigate political intrigue and solve a murder. A combination of Asian court drama (think Nirvana in Fire) and Gothic comedy of manners; a fun and fluffy (*) book involving a mismatched couple, dollops of embarrassing moments, and the occasional kiss.

(*)”fluffy” for Bodard values of fluffy. It still involves a murder investigation, and ideas of consent and rulership and change, because, well–
*helpless shrug*
*hashtag on-brand*

(Art and cover design: Ravven)

Official blurb:

I’ve had to sit on this one for a while, but I’m pleased to have sold my novella Fireheart Tiger to Jonathan Strahan at Tor.com. I’m absolutely thrilled, as I’ve loved a great deal many books published by the imprint (and I can’t wait to see the cover art).

The blurb is below. This is a f/f story of politics, magic and resilience in the face of trauma as well as overwhelming odds. It went some rather dark and unexpected places when I was writing it (story of my life lol). It’s set in a universe heavily inspired by Nguyễn Cochinchina in the 18th Century (prior to the actual dynasty, the unification of Vietnam and the French colonisation), but draws a bit from a bunch of other time periods in Vietnamese history. It will be out in 2021 (I know, so far away!).

(Photo by Nguyen Kiet on Unsplash)

More info at Tor.com!

And if you feel minded to preorder:

Amazon US  | Amazon UK | Kobo

At a time where a lot of you are in lockdown in circumstances that aren’t exactly great for productivity, I thought I’d point out a few things from me that are available free of charge:

-my story “In the Lands of the Spill” is now available in the Avatars Inc anthology, an anthology about telepresence that includes works by Tade Thompson, Pat Cadigan, Ken Liu, Nino Cipri…

-and I’ve made available a bundle of three of my Xuya stories that aren’t easy to find through my Patreon (this is a public post but do feel free to join my Patreon if you want the exciting paying stuff: this is much much appreciated). Go download them here.

So… a question I’ve gotten asked a lot was about a US edition of The House of Sundering Flames, book 3 in the Dominion of the Fallen series. It’s been… tricky (to cut short a long story, I’m out of contract in the US and it’s not super easy to convince a publisher to pick book 3 of a series).

I’m pleased to announce that The House of Sundering Flames is now available for sale through JABberwocky Literary Agency, with a gorgeous atmospheric cover that matches those of the US editions.

Art and cover design is by Dirk Berger, who also did the UK edition of The Tea Master and the Detective (with thanks to John Berlyne for all the help).

This concludes the Dominion of the Fallen series (after The House of Shattered Wings and The House of Binding Thorns). Expect: more Gothic devastated Paris, more dragons, more snark, queer families, Vietnamese immortals, and creepy trees + creepy hawks!

Here’s the cover copy:

The white-hot conclusion to the Dominion of the Fallen trilogy by the multi-award-winning author…

The Great Houses of Paris—headed by Fallen angels and magicians—have co-existed in fragile peace. When a powerful explosion razes House Harrier, old alliances are torn apart and a race begins to fill the power void.

Thuan, the beleaguered dragon head of House Hawthorn, finds a war on his doorstep. Aurore, once cast out by Harrier and almost beaten to death, seeks power to protect her family—and must venture back to her former home. And, in the ruins of House Harrier, Emmanuelle desperately tries to piece her fragmented memories of the explosion.

But beneath House Harrier awaits a fiery magic that hungers for destruction. And it is time for Houses and Houseless to stand together—or be engulfed in flames…

Praise for The House of Sundering Flames:

Incredible… one of the most original, fantasy settings I’ve seen

Adrian Tchaikovsky, Arthur C. Clarke Award-winning author of Children of Ruin

thrilling and creepy A.F., a definite must for fans of de Bodard and fantastical fiction.

Tade Thompson, Arthur C. Clarke Award-winning author of The Rosewater trilogy

The perfect closure of the trilogy! Really took my breath away more than once.

FrauMiest (Goodreads)

Buy book 1, The House of Shattered Wings:

Buy book 2, The House of Binding Thorns:

The third book in Dominion of the Fallen, The House of Sundering Flames, is out now!

Gothic devastated Paris, dragons under the waters of the Seine, flower spirits, ruined houses and monuments–my love letter to the 19th Century with more queer people and more Vietnamese people.

Things are about to burn…

Buy book 1, The House of Shattered Wings:

Buy book 2, The House of Binding Thorns:

A quick reminder that as we approach the publication of The House of Sundering Flames (less than two weeks!!), you can read chapter 1 here!

Come back to a Gothic devastated Paris where dragons, magicians and Fallen angels fight for dominion–and where a devastating explosion ensures that nothing will ever be the same…

(also: Vietnamese dragons! Queer relationships and queer families! Creepy trees and even creepier birds! Sarcasm, flirting and murder(*))

(*)not always in that order or indeed, not always in the same scene

It’s almost a month before publication of the final Dominion of the Fallen book, The House of Sundering Flames (coming July 27th from Gollancz), so here’s a little snippet from the beginning:

In Emmanuelle’s dreams, the world was fire. Angels rose on wings of flame towards a distant, unattainable City: a concoction of mother-of-pearl buildings, enameled domes and white, eye-searing streets in which featureless shapes flowed past each other. At the top of the highest tower was the light of a burning sun—it couldn’t be watched, couldn’t be held within her field of vision without hurting her eyes or burning her face. She reached out towards it—towards Him—and everything fell apart, the flames becoming the jagged shards of a vast, unknowable puzzle raining down on her.

She woke up, and everything hurt. She lay on her back for a while, staring at a sky that wasn’t gray—that wasn’t even the cornflower blue of Lucifer Morningstar’s eyes, or of the heavens as they had been, before the war, before the pall of pollution. It was an odd shade of purple, shading into indigo. As she watched, sounds intruded: distant clatters, and a rumble, like stones collapsing atop each other. It was hot—too hot.

She needed to get up.

What to expect: a Gothic Paris devastated by a magical war, a bi dragon prince with a gift for trouble, explosions, back stabbings and creepy birds! (oh, and creepy trees, too. Because apparently nature is scary insofar as I’m concerned).

If you want to know more, there’ll be a longer excerpt (the whole of chapter 1, which has dragon prince Thuan as an additional point of view character) going out tomorrow with the newsletter: you can sign up here!

More info about the book here.

The funny thing about living in Europe is that I blearily woke up this morning, made a tea to try and wake up while still rubbing my eyes, and while I was making a bottle of milk for my youngest I saw that my twitter mentions had exploded.

Which is basically how I found out that my gender-swapped space opera Sherlock Holmes retelling The Tea Master and the Detective (set in the Xuya Universe  and published by Subterranean Press and by JABberwocky) had won a Nebula Award for Best Novella (the awards were in Los Angeles so 9 hours behind me).

°_°

Below is the full text of my acceptance speech as kindly delivered for me by my good friend Fran Wilde, acceptor extraordinaire:

Uh. Whoa.

That was not expected.

I would like to thank Fran Wilde for accepting this award on my behalf, my editor Yanni Kuznia, Geralyn Lance, Bill Schafer, Gwenda Bond and everyone at Subterranean Press who worked on this book; my cover artists and designers Maurizio Manzieri, Gail Cross at Desert Isle Design and Dirk Berger, my agent John Berlyne as well as the JABberwocky team (Joshua Bilmes, Lisa Rodgers, Patrick Disselhorst) for the non-American edition. To my friends and supporters: Likhain, Zen Cho, Alis Rasmussen, Tade Thompson, Vida Cruz, Victor Fernando R. Ocampo, Cindy Pon, Kari Sperring, Liz Bourke, D Franklin, Zoe Johnson, Jeannette Ng, Nene Ormes, Ken Liu, Elizabeth Bear, Stephanie Burgis, Alessa Hinlo, Inksea, and Mary Robinette Kowal, as well as everyone who spread the word, nominated this and voted for it.

I wrote this book for fun: it was a story that mashed together two of my childhood idols, Sherlock Holmes and Judge Dee, one that came with no deadlines or expectations attached to it. One thing I realised was that it’s easy for writing–for any writing–to feel frivolous and self-indulgent. There are always more important things to do, especially as a mother of colour–children, family, day job, politics in an environment that feels like it’s swinging back to darker days, with people stopping me in the streets and telling me to go back home. It’s so easy to take the path of least resistance and put writing last, to always find something more important that needs to be done.

It’s so easy to choke for lack of self-care.

The truth, of course, is that writing matters. It is frivolous, it is self-indulgent, but it is also necessary. It is breathing space and act of resistance and escapism on my own terms. Stories shaped me as a child and continue to shape me as an adult. And it is a great and potent reminder of how far this particular one has gone to be accepting this award, now.

Thank you.

(picture thanks to Fran Wilde)

Very pleased to reveal my upcoming short story collection with Subterranean Press.

Isn’t it gorgeous? The title was my choice, as it brings together several of my preoccupations! The cover is by artist and friend Maurizio Manzieri, and the cover design by Gail Cross of Desert Isle Design.

A major first collection from a writer fast becoming one of the stars of the genre… Aliette de Bodard, multiple award winner and author of The Tea Master and the Detective, now brings readers fourteen dazzling tales that showcase the richly textured worldbuilding and beloved characters that have brought her so much acclaim. 

Come discover the breadth and endless invention of her universes, ranging from a dark Gothic Paris devastated by a magical war; to the multiple award-winning Xuya, a far-future space opera inspired by Vietnamese culture where scholars administrate planets and sentient spaceships are part of families. 

In the Nebula award and Locus award winning “Immersion”, a young girl working in a restaurant on a colonized space station crosses paths with an older woman who has cast off her own identity. In the novelette “Children of Thorns, Children of Water”, a shapeshifting dragon infiltrating a ruined mansion finds more than he’s bargained for when his partner is snatched by eerie, child-like creatures. And in the award-winning “Three Cups of Grief, by Starlight”, three very different people–a scholar, an engineer and a spaceship–all must deal with the loss of a woman who was the cornerstone of their world. 

This collection includes a never-before seen 20,000-word novella, “Of Birthdays, and Fungus, and Kindness”, set in Bodard’s alternative dark Paris.

It will be published in September 2019 in a gorgeous hardback edition, and include my favourite stories from the Hugo-award nominated Universe of Xuya, as well as some Dominion of the Fallen fiction set in my Gothic devastated Paris (the universe of The House of Shattered Wings, The House of Binding Thorns and the forthcoming The House of Sundering Flames).

The original novella, “Of Birthdays, and Fungus, and Kindness” is a comedy of manners set in the Dominion of the Fallen universe, where Fallen angel Emmanuelle attempts to throw a relaxing birthday party for her partner, and everything goes wrong in all the worst possible ways. Complete with supernatural fungus in a ballroom, meddling immortals and Emmanuelle desperately trying to keep it all going smoothly in spite of her enemies–and of her friends!

Preorders are now open: Subterranean website | Amazon US | Amazon UK | Amazon FR

This is a limited print run. If you want a copy, now would be a good time: my previous novella for Subterranean Press, the Hugo and Nebula award finalist, The Tea Master and the Detective, went out of print relatively fast.