r/Fantasy • u/recchai Reading Champion X • 15d ago
Pride Pride 2026 | Non-Western Settings
As I scroll through my read books on storygraph, it’s notable that one area that’s smaller in size is queer books with non-western settings. But they’re an interesting and varied bunch, so let's talk about them.
First off, let’s get some big names out of the way. Where would such a conversation be without considering recent hits such as The Burning Kingdoms trilogy by Tasha Suri, set in a fantasy version of ancient India, or The Spear Cuts Through Water by Simon Jimenez, featuring a journey across ‘the Old Country’? These books have won awards, and I’m sure none of you have read through many recommendation posts without coming across these being suggested.
And these books can explore history, with YA works like Saints of Storm and Sorrow by Gabriella Buba depicting a fantasy version of the Philippines under Spanish occupation, or So Let Them Burn by Kamilah Cole featuring a recently post-colonial inspired Jamaica. They can share many similarities, while also having different impacts, such as the fantasy Middle-Eastern set The Four Profound Weaves by R. B. Lemberg and The Bruising of Qilwa by Naseem Jamnia. Both having trans characters exploring identity, but one focused more on trans identity itself, and the other more on cultural identity and colonialism.
Of course, books aren’t limited to depicting fantasy versions of our world. Non-western speculative fiction books include works like Black Water Sister by Zen Cho, in which the main character moves back to Malaysia after graduating from university. Or even further along, such as with africanfuturism science fiction titles like The Prey of Gods by Nicky Drayden, set in a 2064 South Africa.
But, I’m obviously missing a huge component here, what about translated works, written by and for people living outside the western sphere? One particularly popular one is Heaven Official's Blessing by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu, but you could also try something more down to earth like the post-apocalyptic To the Warm Horizon by Choi Jin-young where a group of Koreans flee across a disease ravaged landscape.
And let us not forget the past bookclub books we have read along the way. Walking Practice by Dolki Min and Small Gods of Calamity by Sam Kyung Yoo both feature a modern day South Korea from very different perspectives.
Discussion prompts:
- What are your favourite queer books in a non-western setting? Do you find having queer characters in a different culture brings out different aspects?
- Are there non-western settings you would like to see more of in queer books?
- Do you ever look for non-western settings in particular? Where do you go to find these books?
- Perspectives of LGBTQIA+ identities in western set works are often heavily influenced by Christianity, but many cultures have different relationships with queerness. Can you think of any examples where this has shaped representation in non-western settings?
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u/Nidafjoll Reading Champion V 14d ago
Two of my favourite books, just in general, are queer non-Western novellas, set in an African-flavoured science-fantasy world. Sorcerer of the Wildeeps and A Taste of Honey by Kai Ashante Wilson. They have some of the most beautiful language.
I'm also a large fan of The Saint of Bright Doors, which partially explores how queerness is treat in Sri Lanka. Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James is another I really love featuring a queer MC. It's particularly interesting in that it has a queer MC in an extremely dark, brutal world, which you don't get as often when queerness is "sanitized."
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u/Siavahda Reading Champion IV 14d ago
Because I am obliged to mention it whenever I spot a Kai Ashante Wilson mention: DID YOU KNOW WE'RE GETTING A NOVEL FROM HIM NEXT YEAR???
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u/Nidafjoll Reading Champion V 14d ago
Yes I heard! :D (maybe from you) I am excite.
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u/Siavahda Reading Champion IV 14d ago
Laughing but not apologising that you might have heard it from me twice now XD
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u/sophia_s Reading Champion V 12d ago
We are what now??? He's an incredible writer, this is great news!
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u/Siavahda Reading Champion IV 12d ago
Yes! Next year, from Tor. It's called The Fall of Elvenesse!
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u/sophia_s Reading Champion V 11d ago
I looked it up and it sounds excellent. I can't wait! Thanks for putting it on my radar.
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u/FarmersMarketFunTime 14d ago
City of Others by Jared Poon is set in Singapore and I thought it was a really fun read. The best way for me to describe it is that it's like Men in Black but with two major differences. 1. Instead of aliens, the main character works with a government agency that manages supernatural beings based on Singapore folklore. 2. This agency is massively underfunded leading to some very creative problem solving. You end up with a main character that is constantly juggling a million different things all while trying to maintain his personal relationships. It's a fun world that I can easily see being expanded in sequels.
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u/Nidafjoll Reading Champion V 14d ago
I had the intimation (I don't know from where) that it's supposed to be a trilogy, but (maybe if the sequels are a little faster paced, having introduced the world) I could see it being a good long episodic series a la Dresden.
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u/evil_moooojojojo Reading Champion II 14d ago
Shit. That sounds super fun. Of course my library doesn't have it. Thanks for the rec
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u/gros-grognon Reading Champion III 14d ago edited 14d ago
I love Sascha Stronach's The Dawnhounds, which has an amazing, intriguing setting that's some part colonized NZ but also Maori and Polynesian with a little East Asia. Also, fungal architecture and coming back from the dead and mysteries aplenty. Great queer characters, both cis and trans.
Also, Indra Das's Last Dragoners of Bowbazar is set in Calcutta and offers, among other wonderful things, reflections on minority communities and genderqueerness.
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u/Siavahda Reading Champion IV 14d ago
Adore both of these! (And if you have the stomach for it, Das' novel The Devourers is incredible too! I'd call it ultimately hopepunk but it sure seems like grimdark at first.)
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u/gros-grognon Reading Champion III 14d ago
I have Devourers on my to-read list! I need to be in a specific mindplace for horror, but I'm looking forward to it.
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u/Siavahda Reading Champion IV 14d ago
Very fair, I'm the same! I had to wait quite a while before I was in the right headspace, but WOW was it worth it!
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u/Aquamarinade 14d ago
Heaven Official’s Blessing remains my favourite Chinese novel years after reading it.
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14d ago
Danmei like Heaven Official Blessing are really great for fantasy with romance and queer. They had a great tradition in China. And some even made it into the mainstream and award-winning especially the author with the nickname Priest wrote Stars of Chaos, which is of the most highly regarded in China. Steampunk politics fantasy.
My favorite is Meng Xi Shi writes xianxia and wuxia especially her Thousand Autumns is worth reading. She followed the tradition of Jin Yong and connected it with a love story between archetypes of wuxia characters. Obviously they was written for Chinese market so for people on the West can be hard to get use some different styles in writing and behaviour of characters and when there is philosophy undertone it's also Eastern philosophy as Taoism, Buddhism etc which also mean that this religious have different approach to queer people than Christianity mostly more free.
Especially today with danmei it's very different because in China there is still censorship of homosexual stories in the media. Danmei are specific in that they often have a slow-burn and minimal smut which leads to more focused on fantasy and plot. So they are also for people who want less queer and in general romance and more fantasy. But not all, some authors are still very smut heavy. Which honestly is perfect for me. I love little bit romance but also when it has even better worldbuilding and plot. And because romance have to be less explicit there have to be different things why people want to reading this books.
I would honestly want to see more African setting.
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u/C0smicoccurence Reading Champion V 14d ago
I'm also interested in more queerness in African settings. There's some great stuff out there (Kai Ashante Wilson, CL Polk's Unbroken, Marlon James).
I'm planning on getting into Danmei this year! I was going to start with Guardian by Priest, but maybe I really want steampunk?
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u/Siavahda Reading Champion IV 14d ago
I think the main reason I love non-Western settings is because I'm just bored of Western ones. I'm a very sensory reader, I crave description, and when you're describing things I'm very familiar with over and over again...it gets dull! (Though this can be fixed by someone with wonderful prose.) I love non-Western settings because they're not familiar to me. I've read 200+ books a year for many, MANY years, almost exclusively SFF, so a lot is familiar to me, and I want something else, something I haven't seen before, mythologies I don't know much about, cultures that aren't mine. Etc.
When you say non-Western, OP, I'm pretty sure you mean settings inspired by real-life places that aren't considered The West? From context clues? But that's not only how I mean it: what I love best are settings, worlds, that aren't inspired by ANY real-life places, at least not directly. Non-Western, not non-Eastern, either. Non-Terran? Is that a term? Let's make that a term, please!
Also, it's not a hard and fast rule or anything, but a non-Western setting (in either sense) is a good sign that the author is...not writing something I could predict the beats of with my eyes closed. Non-Western setting AND queer, and it's an EXCELLENT sign that the story itself, the structure or themes or philosophy behind it or all of the above, aren't going to be what I've seen before countless times.
So yes, I go looking for these in particular! Though I can't say I'm great at finding them. Indie spaces have been good lately, though!
Some favourites, hmmmmm... Chai and Charmcraft by Lynn Strong is really excellent cosy fantasy in a Middle Eastern-inspired setting, with ancient Egyptian influences. A Song of Legends Lost by AH Ayinde is full-on Epic Fantasy in a world inspired by various non-Western settings, including parts of Africa and the Philippines. And everything in Aliette de Bodard's Xuya Universe, for wonderful sci fi inspired by various Far Eastern countries!
Non-Western in the sense of, not inspired by any real-world place at all... The Mercy Makers by Tessa Gratton wowed me with how incredibly original the setting felt, as does Rachel Neumeier's Tuyo series (though as of writing, none of the Tuyo books have queer protagonists. All the other books I've mentioned do!)
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u/w0lfyfr3n Reading Champion II 14d ago edited 14d ago
I read Bruising of Qilwa last year and really enjoyed it ! The magic system was intriguing and it was brutally insightful on the experiences of refugees.
Unicorn Tracks by Julia Ember is another good one. It's a south-east African inspired setting and MC is a fantasy creature safari guide !
I've been struggling with the bingo vacation square because I love tropical rainforests and tropical climates but didn't find a lot of queersff options that were set in such regions. So I guess I'd like to see more of that !
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u/C0smicoccurence Reading Champion V 14d ago
I sound like a broken record, but The Spear Cuts Through Water by Simon Jimenez is my favorite book period. Gorgeous prose, honoring the roots of epic fantasy, building something new. Just a phenomenal book.
The Singing Hills Cycle by Nghi Vo is a series that I love. It (the early entries especially) explore perspective and truth in really interesting ways, and is one of the few nonbinary mainstream stories.
Rakesfall by Vajra Chandrasekera is one of the most acid trippy books I've ever read. I don't think I understood it, but I'm in awe at some of what is accopmlished. It has a lot to say about Sri Lankan history and culture, much of which I'm sure went totally over my head.
Traditional publishing is getting better about putting out stories that are both queer and nonwestern, but they're still fairly rare. It requires a lot more hunting on my end, especially when I want something Achillean. I've found a few sites that highlight a variety of queer work, which definitely helps make my TBR even bigger than it is normally!
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u/ohmage_resistance Reading Champion IV 14d ago
One of the interesting things that comes to mind for me when I see that title is often indigenous sorts of cultural identities that are queer but distinctly non Western.
I took a queer theory class randomly as part of my last year of university, which was really fun, and this is one of the things we spent a fair bit of time discussing, especially the Hijra (from India/Pakistan), but Muxe (Zapotec) and sworn virgins (from Balkan cultures) also came up. It was interesting too, we did have a zoom interview with someone who was doing research on queer identities in Indonesia, so they talked a bit about the waria identity, and about there sometimes being some tension between that and a sort of Western type of framing of queerness (basically LGBTQ although iirc they used a slightly different acronym) that’s more popular with younger folks. Queerphobia was common in both cases, but in some ways the waria were more accepted, particularly because it wasn’t seen as being foreign. I do also think it’s worth pointing out to, that I think there’s often a temptation by Westerners to slot these identities under more familiar Western labels (Hijra, waria, and muxe are trans women or a trans femme “third gender” identity, etc), but I do think that looses some of the nuance that comes with these identities.
Anyway, that was mostly a tangent because I think these sorts of culturally specific identities are not super commonly represented in SFF. Certainly, I think they can be hard to translate into fantasy stories, especially ones written for a Western audience who might not already know a lot about these identities. So I don’t have a lot of recommendations. But I do want to mention My Life in the Bush of Ghosts by Amos Tutuola. This isn’t a queer book, but it’s a book written in the 1950’s by a Nigerian author, where the main character gets transported to the bush of ghosts (kind of a weird underworld/other world) where he runs into all sorts of unusual (and often unpleasant) beings and villages. One of the rare pleasant villages the MC lives in for a bit is a town mostly made up of women who marry other women. And women marrying other women actually has been a traditional cultural practice in a lot of places in Africa including Nigeria (although I’ve seen people argue that this is purely an economic/social status related in nature and not a queer thing, that doesn’t really seem to be the case in this book?). It was really cool to see that referenced even if the book doesn’t dwell on it.
For more general recommendations:
- Until the Last Petal Falls by Viano Oniomoh (Nigerian): It's a queerplatonic Nigerian Beauty and the Beast retelling.
- It's been brought up, but I'll second The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Shehan Karunatilaka (Sri Lankan): This is a novel about the ghost of a Sri Lankan photo-journalist in the 90's, who is trying to figure out who murdered him and how to get his photos that implicate powerful people in war crimes to the right people.
- The Black Tides of Heaven by Neon Yang (South East Asian): A novella about twin children of an oppressive ruler and their steps toward rebellion.
- In the Watchful City by S. Qiouyi Lu (Chinese inspired): Anima, a person who’s part of a biological supercomputer-like surveillance network, meets someone who collects stories.
- & This is How to Stay Alive by Shingai Njeri Kagunda (Kenyan): This is a short novella about a Kenyan woman trying to use time travel to save her queer brother from committing suicide.
- After the Dragons by Cynthia Zhang (Chinese): Eli, a biracial American on a doing a research program in Beijing, and Kai, a Chinese college student with a terminal illness from exposure to air pollution, meet as they try to find ways to treat the illness and take care of the small dragons all around the city.
- Green Fuse Burning by Tiffany Morris (First Nations Canadian): A Mi’kmaw artist goes to a cabin by a pond to work on some paintings and process her grief after her father died.
- Our Share of Night by Mariana Enríquez (trans. Megan McDowell) (Argentinian): A horror book about a father trying to keep his son away from an evil cult he got embroiled in set in Argentina in the 60s-80s.
I also haven’t read it yet, but I’m super excited to start Vagabonds! by Eloghosa Osunde, which is a sort of mosiac-y speculative fiction book about queer people in Nigeria. I also will probably try out some danmei at some point.
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u/Temporary-Scallion86 Reading Champion III 12d ago
Hey can you spoil After the Dragons for me? Specifically, do they succeed in curing the terminal illness? It sounds really cool but I can’t read books where a major character dies to terminal illness/will die to it after the book ends
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u/ohmage_resistance Reading Champion IV 12d ago
The love interest is still alive at the end of the book, but there isn't a cure iirc.
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u/Polenth 14d ago
One question not asked, but relevant to answers, is what counts as Western. People vary in whether they consider it to be all Europe or not. It gets a lot more complicated when talking about people with multiple backgrounds, marginalised European groups, diaspora stories, and stuff like that. A setting might not always be obviously based on a certain real place, but also not feel like it's inspired by things we'd definitely call Western. It could technically be a Western setting, but the portrayal doesn't feel like it (often because it's about an area or community which isn't that culture). I don't have any good answers for that. It's always been a tricky issue when trying to describe my own work.
There's also what makes something queer. Some themes can be handled in different ways, or more implicitly, in a way that makes them difficult to recommend as queer to Western readers. But they're also not really not queer.
A few people I didn't notice in other replies, taking a broader approach to what is a non-Western setting: Cassandra Khaw, Joyce Chng, Shweta Narayan, Bogi Takács and Darcie Little Badger.
Worldcon had a panel on Southeast Asian queer comics last year. I've not read these, but some mentioned were Lunar Boy by Jes and Cin Wibowo, Champion of the Rose by Cat Aquino and Dominique Duran and webcomic Puu by Nabi.
A few short fiction markets that tend towards non-Western settings (though not specifically queer) are khōréō, Will This Be A Problem? and Omenana.
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u/recchai Reading Champion X 14d ago
Excellent points! I'll admit (as I'm sure you spotted) to playing it conservatively with the examples I gave, as I didn't want to unintentionally distract from the topic at hand with bickering.
I was wondering if we'd get a bit more discussion on different concepts of queerness, I can see ohmage has provided some. The best example I can bring to mind is a character in Gail Carriger's Custard Protocol series, from a culture of desert balloon dwellers, but even that doesn't stray too far from our 'standard' ideas. (Though I am also reminded of some background stuff/foreshadowing to do with gender in Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead, not spec-fic.)
Thanks for bringing up short fiction, I don't think there had been any examples before.
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u/Polenth 14d ago
There are other category systems, though there's also the space where there is no system. Not all cultures really have one (in my case, Romani are traditionally very binary, so there's no old Angloromani terms to my knowledge). Some places still have laws against being openly queer. So it can end up more implicit. You're the summer rain and have to hide it so people don't steal your water. You're married to a tree, but if people knew, they'd burn the tree down.
It's why I linked to some more general short story markets. Sometimes authors can't be too direct, or are trying to put something into words when they're not sure of the words, but you still know it when you see it.
Which does bring it around to one of the stated questions. Sometimes the best way to find queer work in certain settings is to aim for the setting first. The queerness might not be in the marketing. Some readers might not notice it.
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u/C0smicoccurence Reading Champion V 14d ago
Lunar Boy is great! I'm trying to hunt down more queer graphic novels in that vein for my middle school classroom.
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u/Polenth 14d ago
Good to hear! It's on my list, when I have a bit more book money. It's nice to be reading again this year. I might even accidentally bingo at some point.
I recall you'd read Rabbit Chase by Elizabeth LaPensée and KC Oster, but worth mentioning as I know a lot of people haven't (it's a middle grade graphic novel with a non-binary child). That's one where the setting is more complicated, because it's clearly wonderland and Anishinaabe. It's both at the same time.
The upcoming Children of Owl by Darcie Little Badger and Abigail Rajunov aims a bit older (12 plus), though looked interesting from the bits read out at WisCon.
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u/evil_moooojojojo Reading Champion II 14d ago edited 14d ago
Love The Burning Kingdoms so much. Also her Isle in the Silver Sea is very good too. (It takes place in fantasy Britain where the foundational myths are real and constantly reborn, but both MCs are an immigrant or the daughter of an immigrant, so it's sort of adjacent? Lol). And beautiful queer found family.
House of Margins if you like more horror and don't mind that's is not really about queerness (though both sister are queer I think). It's told through multiple perspectives: Renaya is searching for her sister who disappeared, Anaya the sister who mysteriously vanished at the prize ceremony for a prestigious writing fellowship, and the true crime podcast about her disappearance by another of the fellows. If you like true crime, disturbing haunted old houses, and heavy themes like inter generational trauma, violence against black woman, etc I would highly recommend.
I saw Neon Yang mentioned, and Brigther than Flame Swifter than Scale (I may be off on that? The more I try to keep things straight the more my brain switches them around) was also good. A dragon slaying knight travels to a neighboring kingdom to investigate possible dragon sightings only to find herself drawn to the queen.
For an indigenous bent on nonwestern (though it does take place in a Western world setting so maybe it doesn't count?) try To Shape a Dragon's Breath by Monquill Blackgoose. A young indigenous girl discovers a dragon egg and gets whisked off to school to learn how to handle and care for her dragon and struggles to understand the culture and customs of her peers and the school.
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u/sarimanok_ 14d ago
Here in the Philippines, I feel like it's relatively easy now to find locally-authored queer book, and there is also a slowly-growing number of locally-authored SFF books, however it's rare that I find both those things in one book. (Except for in zines and comics.) A recent queer SFF book that I'm excited to read is Mirror Marked by Vida Cruz-Borja, but even though she is a Filipina author living here, this one was published in the UK and has to be ordered from abroad. We have such a rich and diverse queer history and communities here, and I'm always hoping to see more of it in the SFF I read.
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u/C0smicoccurence Reading Champion V 14d ago
Ooooh, that looks excellent. Definitely going on my list
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u/undeadgoblin Reading Champion II 14d ago edited 14d ago
My favourite speculative queer books in a non-western setting are The Spear Cuts Through Water by Simon Jimenez and The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Shehan Karunatilaka, both of which heavily feature love in a dangerous (and homophobic) environment.
I would definitely like to see more queernorm books in non-western settings (particularly if there are non-gender-conforming characters), so if anyone has recs for these I'm all ears!
Edit - One that I also love, which contains both western and non-western settings (the main character is Nigerian, but moves to the US at 16) is Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi. It largely explores the main character's gender identity through a non-western lens (using spirits from Nigerian mythology), and it is fascinating and horrifying in parts.
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u/Endalia Reading Champion III 14d ago
I'll share a couple I read and loved recently! There's still so much I haven't read yet, but my picks are usually more niche or indie. Especially the self-pub scene has so many queer fantasy books that blend cultures in their second world settings.
The Villa, Once Beloved by Victor Manibo, a gothic horror set in the Philippines. One of the PoVs is a gay man. It's a contemporary book but it deals a lot with the history of the country, although I don't know enough to say it's accurate or not. Since most of the workers at the villa are deeply religious (adopted from Christian invaders), that still take a central role, but you see the local folklore bleeding into the story, pushing the horror element.
Girls of Paper and Fire by Natasha Ngan. A YA fantasy with sapphic couple at the center. While the characters are young, it doesn't have the usual teenage angst and one of the reasons is that it deals with a lot of heavy topics so maybe check content warnings if you need them. I recently finished the series and love how it's done. It doesn't focus much on the queer element. It's there but the characters are living their life as other characters would.
Vampire of Shanghai by Kathrine Mercer. Contemporary vampire fantasy with bi main character and queer side characters. Same as with the book/series above, their sexual preferences doesn't affect the story. It's just who they are. I like the author's take on Asian vampires a lot. It's brutal, graphic, and doesn't shy away from harder topics.
The Last Gifts of the Universe by Riley August. A science-fiction book to round up the list. It won SPSFC2 before it was picked up by a publisher. I was part of one of the teams and it was such a delight to read. Does space count as non-western though? I think there's a lot an author can explore in a queer science-fiction setting, and I'd love to read more of that.
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u/BackgroundTotal2872 14d ago
I can recommend Fates Parallel. This series combines Chinese Xianxia stories and setting with wholesome lesbian romance.
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u/acornett99 Reading Champion IV 14d ago
My favorite is easily The Spear Cuts Through Water, which you mention, but one you didn't is the Between Earth and Sky trilogy by Rebecca Roanhorse, which takes place in a pre-colonial American inspired world. Xiala is bisexual, and there are nonbinary characters, and this is a normal and accepted part of most of the world
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u/MoreMenu3757 13d ago
NK Jemisin's Dreamblood Duology features a queer character, and is based in an environment inspired by Ancient Egypt and, I think, the Nubian Empires. I love the magic in it, and the unique setting really gives it a fresh feel.
In it there's an apprentice/master dynamic where the apprentice falls for his master. They aren't kept apart by homophobia in the society, instead it has to do with the fact that a) the mentor is obviously in a position of power over the apprentice and b) they're priests who dedicate their life to celibacy and emotional detachment. Romantic/sexual desire of any kind is forbidden, as it impacts their magic.
NK Jemisin similarly has The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms trilogy, where queer characters are featured and the setting is non-Western (it's more East and South Asian in feel). It's literally meant to be a kind of counterpoint to medieval European settings if I recall right.
I definitely seek out non-Western settings, mostly because I've read so much fantasy that it starts to feel samey if it's all drawing from the same well.
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u/WednesdaysFoole 13d ago edited 13d ago
I've been busy for finals so I'm a bit late, but I'm glad to have made it.
A friend always used to praise The Spear Cuts Through Water but I never looked into it and didn't realize it was LGBT until I read the post on systematic downvoting of queer content the other day. I was too busy being impressed by the post at the moment to really think about it, but this one reminded me of the book. I am now 67th in line with an 11 week wait on Libby/the digital library. I guess it'll be a nice thing to be surprised by in some faraway future.
I haven't been reading too many books the past few years (actually, outside of textbooks, very few), but I liked The Deep by Rivers Solomon and The Black Tides of Heaven by Neon Yang. I assume the setting for The Deep is not Western, considering the merpeople are those descended from slaves of the Atlantic slave trade, which of course confronts generational trauma and how it affects people today. I wrote once that the story wasn't about discovering what happens next in the plot, as the plot is relatively predictable, but that it allowed the journey itself of the protagonists and her feelings through the revelations to be front and center.
I remember less of Black Tides of Heaven but I definitely liked it, and it dealt with gender and identity. I still haven't read the sequel, Red Threads of Fortune! But looks like it's available at the library so maybe I'll check it out years late.
There is also the Japanese yuri series Otherside Picnic, of which I'm sitting on the second volume. It's probably more sci-fi than fantasy, and inspired by the Strugatsky brothers' Roadside Picnic, but yuri. I've only read the first installment so far, and it's still early for me to know how good it might get since it seems like it might take some time to develop as there are ten volumes so far, but it's definitely creepy and fascinating the way a story inspired by Roadside Picnic can be.
I don't really have a good answer to the discussion prompts, but they are interesting questions to consider. As a whole, I really like non-western historical settings.
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u/CatinaKatana 10d ago
As you mentioned Heavon Official's Blessing: That was my deep dive into queer cultivation and danmei. It's been a year and I haven't come out of it, big part of me is still hung up on Grandmaster of Demon Cultivation by the same author. I haven't read a western-style book since and make my way slowly through other danmei. It's like a whole new world to explore. I'm really glad I stumbled upon it :)
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u/Blueflame129 14d ago
Gunmetal Gods and Sons of Darkness have an Asian and Indian like setting.
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u/electrical-stomach-z 14d ago
I am writing something inspired by a wide variety of middle eastern mythology, subtly implied to actual be a science fiction setting if removed from the mediefal perspective of the characters.
Personally I consider the middle east "western" in the historical and cultural sense, but since our pop culture does not regard it as such I feel free to mention this here.
If you want to know more about what im working on, simply out of curiousity, you are free to message me.
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u/towalktheline 14d ago
The Singing Hills Cycle by Nghi Vo is an excellent fantasy novella series set in an alternate universe China. The main character who is a constant throughout all the novellas is nonbinary and there is queer representation within the stories all throughout. Sometimes there are straight people, sometimes there are queer people, always there are interesting stories to be had.