Emerald Spirit: An Isekai Romantasy (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9798251421637)

For anyone who has ever loved a tradition from the outside of it - and found their way in.

Sathea Bun is eighteen, Khmer-American, and has been reaching toward the inside of classical dance for six years. On the night she finally tells her mother the truth she's been carrying for three years, she falls asleep at her keyboard and wakes up in Srok Moreakot - a spirit realm drawn from Khmer cosmology, at war, where the ancient form she's been chasing exists in its complete, uncodified form. The realm called her here for a reason. What she finds: a ward-network failing at nine anchor points, a traitor in the council, and Chansereyvuth - the Junior Keeper of the Northern Groves, three hundred years of composed precision, who has been doing everything correctly and alone for sixty years. Back in Modesto, Sathea's mother is keeping a secret of her own.

Navigating a world that has welcomed her but hasn't made room for her, Sathea must master a dance tradition from the inside out, survive the political intrigues of a realm in crisis, and reckon with the growing suspicion that the secrets she's keeping are not entirely her own. Emerald Spirit is a slow-burn queer romance and multigenerational family story that asks the question at the heart of both: can you be loved by your family as what you actually are?

For readers of Shelley Parker-Chan, R.F. Kuang, and Zen Cho. For anyone who has ever loved something that hadn't quite made room for them yet.