The Crane Moon Cycle is a queer/sapphic romantic fantasy set in a world inspired by Chinese cultivation novels (xianxia), a story of love, redemption, found family, trauma and healing. It exists as two separate books (The Phoenix and the Sword/The Shoreless River) AND as an omnibus duology (both books in one volume). In the omnibus version, there’s also a bonus chapter that points towards the next book in the world. There are some things that some readers may find difficult, and if you would like more details, please click here.
Aili Fallon, a young woman living in a world preparing for war, encounters a mysterious woman, Liu Chenguang, who begs her not to go to the war zone. When Liu Chenguang disappears, leaving Aili burdened with immortality and a whip of phoenix fire, Aili pursues her into a past life and another world to uncover the binding that neither of them can break.
One might ask, very fairly, why I have these different versions of the same books. The truth is that I originally wrote The Phoenix and the Sword and The Shoreless River as one enormous book. In traditional publishing the length would probably not have been acceptable for a debut, and as I was educating myself about publishing as an industry I decided to split the story into two books – there was a natural breaking point near the middle, after all, where the initial mystery of the first book is solved. I didn’t realize that as an indie author, wordcount was not an issue! It does make a print copy expensive, but for an ebook, it doesn’t matter. Many indie authors publish much longer books, because the economics of publishing for an indie author are a bit different than for a large publishing house.
Once the books were out in the world, separately, I realized that not everyone was reading both books. (Yes, I was very naive before I published books.) And I worried about those readers, because Phoenix, being the midpoint of a larger story, does not provide all the satisfaction I want the reader to have. It’s almost a cliffhanger (OK, it’s a cliffhanger). Mysteries are solved and the characters have reached an important place, but it’s not a stopping place. The story isn’t over. All the most satisfying twists and turns and reveals and resolutions are still ahead; the reader that didn’t continue with Book 2 wouldn’t have them!
So I decided to issue both books together as an omnibus version, and keep the price at a level that would be better than buying two books separately, to encourage readers to get the full story. Whether you buy the books separately or as the omnibus, I truly hope you get to the end to get all the reading experience of the story’s resolution, and find the characters at their new beginning.
Making my books widely available was also very important to me. It is one of the most rewarding things to see books sold in Europe, North America, South America, South and Southeast Asia, and Australia! That’s why my books are not in KU now. Books in KU can’t be available on any other platform, and there are places where Amazon is not available, or other platforms are more accessible and convenient. Books in KU also can’t be in libraries in e-book form. So while I am not in KU, I am in Kobo Plus (a subscription plan just like KU on Kobo, but without KU’s exclusivity rule). You can find my ebooks on any platform, you can ask your library to stock them as ebooks or paperbacks (please do!), you can order copies from your local bookstore.
My next goal is to make the duology available as audiobooks, but this is a big investment, so it may take a while. Wherever you find them, happy reading, and please review if you can – it really helps other readers find the books – and recommend them to friends if you enjoyed the story!