We’re wishing The Mountain Crown by Karin Lowachee a very happy book birthday!
Méka returns home from exile for an ancient, necessary rite in the first in The Crowns of Ishia novella trilogy, a fantasy western of colonialism and indigeneity from the critically acclaimed author of Warchild.
Méka must capture a king dragon, or die trying.
War between the island states of Kattaka and Mazemoor has left no one unscathed. Méka’s nomadic people, the Ba’Suon, were driven from their homeland by the Kattakans. Those who remained were forced to live under the Kattakan yoke, to serve their greed for gold alongside the dragons with whom the Ba’Suon share an empathic connection.
A decade later and under a fragile truce, Méka returns home from her exile for an ancient, necessary rite: gathering a king dragon of the Crown Mountains to maintain balance in the wild country. But Méka’s act of compassion toward an imprisoned dragon and Lilley, a Kattakan veteran of the war, soon draws the ire of the imperialistic authorities. They order the unwelcome addition of an enigmatic Ba’Suon traitor named Raka to accompany Méka and Lilley to the mountains.
The journey is filled with dangers both within and without. As conflict threatens to reignite, the survival of the Ba’Suon people, their dragons, and the land itself will depend on the decisions – defiant or compliant – that Méka and her companions choose to make. But not even Méka, kin to the great dragons of the North, can anticipate the depth of the consequences to her world.
“A stunning accomplishment.” —Aurealis
“For die-hard fans of dragon-riding books, this is sure to satisfy.” —Publishers Weekly
“This thoughtful, anti-colonial take on dragons—or, rather, suon—and the consequences of greed kept me turning the pages from fierce start to fiery conclusion.” —Kamilah Cole, bestselling author of So Let Them Burn
