Series The Books of the Raksura

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Novellas and Short Stories

Short Stories about Wind-Ship Escarpment

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The seven books of Raksura series—five novels and two volumes of Stories of the Raksura (each of which contain two novellas)—follow Moon on his journey from terrified outcast to powerful leader. In Book One, The Cloud Roads, Moon is the only shape-shifter among the tribes of the river valley. He has no memory of his birth parents, but knows that he must hide his identity in order to be accepted by his adopted home. Inevitably, his identity is discovered, but in a stroke of fortune he meets another shape-shifter like himself, and is able to escape to a new life…one with its own complications. Moon soon finds himself among the Indigo Court of the Raksura, a wide-ranging family of shape-shifters, and for the first time, knows that he belongs. He even becomes consort to the sister queen Jade, a position of high honor in the Indigo Court. But no sooner has he begun his new life than more worries arise: blight at the heart of the Court’s central tree, rival Courts bent on war, and mysteries surrounding Moon’s own origin. Throughout the series Wells shows us facets of a gorgeous, complex world, informing a story of one character’s desire to find a true home. She explores the gender politics through Moon’s story—as one of the few fertile males of the Raksura, he’s expected to be Jade’s consort to provide her with children, which gives him a certain status but also means that his life is lived in Jade’s service. As bisexuality is the default orientation of the Raksura, certain assumptions that are made in other fantasy worlds are completely up-ended here. (English, Unclassified)