Category Archives: writing

Asian fantasy is hitting the YA market!

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silver_phoenixI have been looking out for the release of “Silver Phoenix” for months! I came across the gorgeous cover and Cindy Pon’s name once when browsing Absolute Write for information about agents. I checked out her website and blog immediately and was thrilled to my toes to see that this novel was going to be released in May 2009. (Correction! The release date is actually April 28, 2009. Thanks Cindy!)

“Silver Phoenix: Beyond the Kingdom of Xia” is a heroic Asian fantasy about Ai Ling (yes, I did wince at the name similarity to Ai Li) a girl with extraordinary gifts who embarks upon a journey to find her missing father.

I’m going to start stalking bookstores for this. I’m sure I’ll find other similarities since this story is set in the same wuxia (martial arts heroic fiction) genre, but I’m hoping (selfishly) that this indicates there’s a market for what I write. Even though this book is YA, it seems like there must be a lot of crossover potential. I’m certainly going to read it! And if Asian fantasy can penetrate the YA market…oh, the possibilities!

Cindy has a fabulous trailer for it on her website. Check it out!

She also has a release party going on until June 8th. Follow this link.

Poll Results: Opening for Butterfly Swords

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Thanks for the participating in the poll!

The results overwhelmingly favored the heroine’s opening 62% versus the hero 38%.

Ai Li’s opening is actually the newest opening; the one I’m currently submitting. I was very torn since Ryam’s opening had some success — it’s the opening that placed in two chapter contests as well as the RWA Golden Heart contest.

Ryam’s opening is the opening I’ve had in my head from the beginning. If there was ever a movie (hee hee) it’s the opening I’d prefer. Stranger in a strange land, mysterious woman catches his eye, he gets harassed by the locals to create some sympathy. I kept on getting feedback from different people to speed up the action to which I was very opposed. I need the slow opening before the action erupts — otherwise who cares about this guy?

Ai Li’s opening caters to the trend of starting with action. It addressed issues that people had with the heroine’s goal not being clear enough at the beginning. It also places you immediately in China with the wedding dress and the sedan. The cons are that it is more confusing – the action starts immediately, there’s strange words like “palanquin”, there’s disorientation before you figure out what’s going on. I’m okay with some disorientation at the beginning, but it’s harder to care about a character when calamity strikes immediately.

Ryam’s scene does still follow the action opening so I definitely don’t lose his POV. Thanks much for all the comments! I have gathered some new ideas for what to add on in the next pass, though I’m holding myself back for now. This was fun to see.

If you’d like to see the excerpts:

Excerpts:

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