Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame

by Neon Yang

Overview

With an armored, oath-bound hero reminiscent of The Mandalorian and the Asian-inspired epic fantasy of She Who Became the Sun, Neon Yang’s Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame is a stunning queer novella about a dragon hunter finding home with a dragon queen.

Few know the true identity of the masked guildknight of Mithrandon.

She barely remembers herself.

The masked guildknight—Yeva—was thirteen when she killed her first dragon. With her gift revealed, she was shipped away to the imperial capital to train in the rare art of dragon-slaying. Now a legendary dragon hunter, she has never truly felt at home—nor removed her armor in public—since that fateful day all those years ago.

Yeva must now go to Quanbao, a fiercely independent and reclusive kingdom. It is rumored that there, dragons are not feared as is right and proper, but instead loved and worshipped. It is rumored that there, they harbor a dragon behind their borders.

While Yeva searches for the dreaded beast, she is welcomed into the palace by Quanbao’s monarch, Lady Sookhee. Though wary of each other, Yeva is shocked to find herself slowly opening up to the beautiful, mysterious queen.

As they grow closer, Yeva longs to let Lady Sookhee see the person behind the armor, but she knows she must fulfill her purpose and slay the dragon. Ultimately, she must decide who—or what—she is willing to betray: her own heart, or the sacred duty that she has called home for so long.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781250357342
Publisher:	Tor Publishing Group
Publication date:	05/06/2025
Pages:	176
Product dimensions:	5.00(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Neon Yang (they/them) is a queer non-binary author based in the UK. They have been nominated for the Hugo, Nebula, World Fantasy, Lambda Literary, Ignyte, and Locus Awards, and their Tensorate series of novellas (The Red Threads of Fortune, The Black Tides of Heaven, The Descent of Monsters, and The Ascent to Godhood) was an Otherwise Award Honoree. In previous incarnations, Neon was a molecular biologist, a science communicator, a writer for animation, games and comic studios, and a journalist for one of Singapore's major papers.

Editorial Reviews

03/03/2025

A dragon hunt goes awry in this sweet fantasy from Yang (The Genesis of Misery). Kunlin Yeva is 13 when she kills her first dragon and her proud parents send her to the Mithrandon guild to train as a dragon hunter. The decision tears Yeva away from everything she’s ever known and ultimately leads her parents to split up. Now a legendary hunter known as the guildknight, Yeva mourns her lost childhood and never removes her armor. When the emperor orders her to hunt down a dragon believed to be terrorizing the neighboring kingdom of Quanbao, Yeva has no choice but to go, though she knows that in Quanbao dragons are worshipped rather than feared. There, Yeva meets Quanbao’s girl-king, Lady Sookhee, and the women swiftly strike up a romance. When Yeva is tasked with guarding the entrance to the forbidden caverns beneath the palace, she discovers something that tests her loyalty both to her lover and to her guild. Yang seamlessly intertwines Yeva’s search for the dragon with her longing for the home she left behind. The result is a brisk and satisfying tale full of love, hope, and yearning. (May)

Publishers Weekly

A lovely, intricate gem of a fairy tale about finding yourself in another person and traveling distant lands to finally come home. I loved it.”—Olivie Blake, New York Times bestselling author of The Atlas Six

“A brisk and satisfying tale full of love, hope, and yearning.”—Publishers Weekly

“Beautifully written and brimming with lush detail, Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame is the sapphic lady knight story of my dreams. A perfectly satisfying tale of knights, dragons, duty, and finding your way home.”—M. Stevenson, author of Behooved

"Yang’s emotion-laden novella will be a hit with fans of dragons and slow-burn romantasy. Readers of Aliette de Bodard and the “Singing Hills Cycle” series by Nghi Vo will especially enjoy Yang’s prose.”—Library Journal, STARRED review

“Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame is a beautiful story of reclaiming one’s heritage to arrive at a new, unimagined place. At times exciting and at times measured, it has both a fast pace and deep characters.”—Sung-il Kim, author of Blood of the Old Kings

"Yang presents readers with a folklore-inspired tale complete with queer love and a coming-of-age story. . . [a] lush, mythological novella.”—Booklist

"Delightful. . . There’s a great deal to love in Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame.”—Locus

PRAISE FOR THE TENSORATE SERIES

“Joyously wild stuff. Highly recommended.”—The New York Times

“Yang captures an epic sweep in compact, precise prose.”—Publishers Weekly, STARRED review

“A fantastic novella . . . I can't wait to see what else Yang will do.”—Locus

“Full of love and loss, confrontation and discovery. Each moment is a glistening pearl, all strung together in a wonder of world-creation.”—Ken Liu, Hugo, Nebula, and World Fantasy Award winning author of The Grace of Kings and The Paper Menagerie

“I love Neon Yang’s effortlessly fascinating world-building.”—Kate Elliott, author of Black Wolves and Court of Fives

“A fascinating world of battles, politics, magic and romance.”—Zen Cho, author of Sorcerer to the Crown

“Filled with memorable characters and set in a wonderfully imaginative and original universe.”—Aliette de Bodard, Nebula Award-winning author of The House of Shattered Wings

“Like a Miyazaki movie decided to jump off the screen and sear itself into prose, and in doing so became something entirely new.”—Indrapramit Das, author of The Devourers

“Relentlessly captivating, heartbreaking, and powerful.”—Fran Wilde, award-winning author of Updraft, Cloudbound, and Horizon

From the Publisher

★ 03/01/2025

Taken from her homeland as a child, Yeva has powerful blood that makes her a useful tool for the empire. Yeva serves the Sun Emperor as his fiercest dragon slayer, a guildknight who moves through Mithrandon as something of a mystery to everyone else. Yeva rarely removes her armor and mask, preferring to interact with the world from beneath her layers of fabric and metal. When she is sent to the neighboring Quanbao in search of a dragon whom the emperor wants dead, she must face the past that she has been conditioned to forget. An oddity already, Yeva is even more so in a land that reveres dragons and is led by Lady Sookhee, whose own condition makes her sick at times and unable to hold court. Yeva must learn to reconnect with who she was before becoming the emperor's weapon and discover not only the answers to Lady Sookhee's mysteries but also her ruler's true intentions. VERDICT Yang's (The Genesis of Misery) emotion-laden novella will be a hit with fans of dragons and slow-burn romantasy. Readers of Aliette de Bodard and the "Singing Hills Cycle" series by Nghi Vo will especially enjoy Yang's prose.—Kristi Chadwick

Library Journal