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).