Genre:
Fantasy
Themes:
Adoption / Surrogacy
Age Gap
Angsty
Dark Fantasy
Dating Disaster
Disaster
Enemies to Lovers
Fairytale
Family Relationships
Fish Out of Water
Forced Proximity / Stranded Together
Found Family
Ice Queen
Interracial / Multicultural Relationship
Magic
Mature Lead 40+
Mythology
Nursed Back to Health
Opposites Attract
Paranormal Encounters
Post-Apocalyptic
Single Parent
Wounded / Illness
Heat Level:
Fade to Black (sex scenes are mostly implied and use euphemistic language)
Archetypes:
Artist / Graphic Designer / Illustrator
Deity / Mythological
Doctor / Nurse / EMT / Midwife
Librarian / Bookseller
Magician
Sorcerer / Wizard / Alchemist
Teacher / Professor
Werewolf / Shifter
Geographic Location:
Fantasy or Fictional Setting
Setting:
Academic / School / University
Afterlife / Underworld
Castle / Palace
Kingdom / Realm
Manor House / Estate
Museum / Library
Seaside / Beach
Small Town / Rural
Sexual / Gender Identity:
Bi or Pansexual
Lesbian
Protagonist Identity:
Asian
In the Vanishers’ Palace
By Aliette de Bodard
Sapphic Vietnamese Beauty and the Beast where the beast is a shapeshifting dragon and beauty a stubborn scholar
From the award-winning author of the Dominion of the Fallen series comes a dark retelling of Beauty and the Beast.
In a ruined, devastated world, where the earth is poisoned and beings of nightmares roam the land…
A woman, betrayed, terrified, sold into indenture to pay her village’s debts and struggling to survive in a spirit world.
A dragon, among the last of her kind, cold and aloof but desperately trying to make a difference.
When failed scholar Yên is sold to Vu Côn, one of the last dragons walking the earth, she expects to be tortured or killed for Vu Côn’s amusement.
But Vu Côn, it turns out, has a use for Yên: she needs a scholar to tutor her two unruly children. She takes Yên back to her home, a vast, vertiginous palace-prison where every door can lead to death. Vu Côn seems stern and unbending, but as the days pass Yên comes to see her kinder and caring side. She finds herself dangerously attracted to the dragon who is her master and jailer. In the end, Yên will have to decide where her own happiness lies—and whether it will survive the revelation of Vu Côn’s dark, unspeakable secrets…
Advance praise for In the Vanishers’ Palace
“Another stellar offering by Bodard. Her signature intensity is on display in this tale of people (and dragons) struggling to survive in the ruins of an alien conquest. Emotionally complex relationships interweave with richly drawn and deftly nuanced world-building.” —Kate Elliott, author of the Court of Fives series
“A transformative experience. With dragons.” —Fran Wilde, Hugo and Nebula nominated author of The Bone Universe and The Gemworld series