On April 26, NYT & Indie Bestselling author Joan He revealed through Twitter the cover to her forthcoming 2022 Chinese YA Fantasy titled, Strike The Zither, which is slated for a Fall release with Fierce Reads.
According to her initial book deal from 2021, He’s novel is a “reimagining of the Chinese military epic ‘Romance of the Three Kingdoms’ in which a strategist must help her warlordess to victory against the rival kingdoms to the north and the south while overcoming her fate as written by the gods.”
Her Twitter thread continues to state that the novel contains: “[her] most manipulative characters yet / backstabbing / real stabbing & war / rivals to lovers to đź’”” and more.
Cover artist is Kuri Huang and designer is Aurora Parlagreco.
Strike The Zither is planned to be a duology. The full summary reads:
The year is 414 of the Xin Dynasty, and chaos abounds. A puppet empress is on the throne. The realm has fractured into three factions and three warlordesses hoping to claim the continent for themselves.
But Zephyr knows it’s no contest.
Orphaned at a young age, Zephyr took control of her fate by becoming the best strategist of the land and serving under Xin Ren, a warlordess whose loyalty to the empress is double-edged—while Ren’s honor draws Zephyr to her cause, it also jeopardizes their survival in a war where one must betray or be betrayed. When Zephyr is forced to infiltrate an enemy camp to keep Ren’s followers from being slaughtered, she encounters the enigmatic Crow, an opposing strategist who is finally her match. But there are more enemies than one—and not all of them are human.
Strike The Zither by Joan He is set to be released October 25, 2022!
The Booked Shelf 