Mia Tsai's Bitter Medicine is a contemporary fantasy with at least a strong romance strand, set in what seems to be a somewhat more magical version of our world - I'm not sure if this is openly more magical, or more of a secret history. (The latter is more traditional and common, but every writer gets to pick whether and how to follow tradition.)
Our two main characters are Elle, descended from the Chinese god of medicine but working as a magical calligrapher for a temp agency, and Luc, a half-elf security expert. From the description on the back, their interactions with each other and their complicated families are the story - not to say that Tsai doesn't weave in anything else, but there's no sign of saving the world or anything like that. And I am 100% on board with more fantasy books that don't require the world to be saved, so that makes this immediately more intriguing.
1 comment:
I read it last year, and it's a solid piece of writing, with capable prose. The protagonists' goals and decisions drive the plot, and they feel things deeply but don't (to me) come across as whiny.
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