BACK JACKET HACK-JOB: STRONGER THAN A BRONZE DRAGON

A post by Mary Fan

Hey everyone! Mary here, fresh off a red-eye from California and completely zombified as a result (it doesn't help that I didn't get much sleep over the weekend either... friend's wedding, jet lag, flights booked to minimize hotel stays but also as a consequence minimize sleep...). Anyway, what better time to make a hack job out of a back cover description, right?

For those who don't know, Back Jacket Hack-Job is a recurring series on Across the Board where we take turns describing books terribly. Partly because I'm too brain dead to think of anything else and partly because I'm vain, I'm going to pick on my own recently released YA steampunk fantasy, Stronger Than A Bronze Dragon. Here we go...

Once upon a time, in a land far far away, but probably not the one you were thinking of, with European-style castles and knights in shining armor, but one that steals ideas and aesthetics from 19th century China and faffs around with them because why not have bronze automatons wandering down the street and completely historically inaccurate versions of mythology...

... there lived a teenage peasant girl in a tiny village. Her life was tough. Like, really tough. But she was also really pretty. So when a rich man came to town and saw her, he was like "OMG I'm going to marry her and make her royalty." And she was like "fine." And they all lived happily ever after.

Just kidding, this isn't actually Cinderella. See, the girl in this story, Anlei, is a village guard who spends her evenings fighting shadow demons. And the rich man, a viceroy, actually just wants a magical dragon's pearl owned by the village. So he's like, "Hey, give me the pearl, and I'll protect your village from shadow demons." And he has all these powerful magical steampunk dragons that can blast those suckers back to Hell much faster than a few peasants with swords can. So the village headman is like, "Okay, sure. But I know that rich dudes have zero qualms about taking from poor dudes and then reneging on their promises, so to seal the deal, you have to marry a local girl." And the viceroy's like "Okay, sure. That one's hot -- I'll marry her." And "that one" is Anlei, who's like, "Hell no... oh crap, the whole fate of my village hinges on my saying yes to the dress, doesn't it? Fine, dammit. I hate everyone."

But the day of the wedding, some punk named Tai steals the pearl. And Anlei's like, "Ugh, without that thing, what's the point of any of this?" So she goes after him. And chases him literally to Hell and back just to get that stupid thing back.

Must be some pearl.