Swords and Spaceships for February 19: SFF for the Lunar New Year

A bandit walks into a coffee house, and his life immediately gets very interesting in a bad way: he finds himself in possession of a sacred object and a young votary who wants to see it protected and doesn’t care what trouble she causes along the way.

In the human kingdom, crops are failing and the sun hasn’t shone in years. Two seventeen-year-old girls are sent on a dangerous journey to the city of the fairy queen. They begin to fall in love, though at the end of their task is the harsh reality that their kingdom only needs one huntress as a savior, not two.

A poor scholar and a mindship who is a notorious thief and master of disguise must team up to solve a mysterious murder that puts their relationship, one built on secrets, to the ultimate test.

In the past, the Dragon Songs could summon storms and rout entire armies, but they have long been forgotten. Now a naive young musician must find her her way to the song and the Dragon Scale Lute with the aid of a foreign Paladin. Though once that instrument is in her hands, will she save the world–or destroy it?

Min comes from a long line of fox spirits, but her mother insists the entire family eschew fox magic for their own safety. When she learns that her older brother Jun has left his Space Force post to search for the fabled Dragon Pearl, she knows something must be terribly wrong. She runs away from her family and home planet to find him and clear his name, embarking on a question that will test her–and her magic–in ways she could ever have imagined.

It’s gunpowder engines versus steam power in an alternate history of the Opium War. After the Emperor orders the execution of his engineers for their failure to drive back the British invasion, Jin, the daughter of one of those engineers, has been laying low. But now the Crown Prince is launching a secret effort to expel the British, and Jin may hold the key to building the engines that will bring their freedom.

Lei is from the paper caste, the lowest in Ikhara after the conquest of the moon caste demons. After losing her mother ten years ago to royal guards, she’s frightened to see them return–this time for her. She is one of nine girls brought to the palace to learn the skills of a consort, forced to entertain the demon king for a year. But she falls in love with another of the paper girls, and finds the fire to fight for herself–and revenge.

Kira is a demon hunter, the bodyguard of the prince, and the only woman in the king’s army. When the king is murdered and the unearthed traitors point to a coming demon invasion, she goes on the run with her charge, who may be the only one who can defeat the Demon Lord according to a cryptic prophecy. With only that prophecy as her guide, Kira must keep her prince alive–and raise him to be a king.