Welcome to My World:
Your guide to every novel and short story set in the Southlands.
(I will add comics eventually. This is a work-in-progress. Thanks for your patience.)
Novels:
All my novels are set in the same world, and mostly in the same country: Goredd, one of three nations (along with Ninys and Samsam) that make up a region called the Southlands. North is the Tanamoot, the dragons’ homeland, and the unaffiliated city-state of Porphyry. South are the Archipelagos, home to many nations, and the polar regions. Each book has taught me more about the world, and I promise you, there’s still so much we haven’t seen.
Seraphina
First of the Seraphina duology, set forty years after the peace treaty that ended a long war between humans and dragons. Now dragons may come to Goredd in human form (called a saarantras), as long as they wear a bell to let the humans know who’s who. Although they can get an exemption, sometimes. And then there are the quigutl, a subspecies of dragon, resembling large iguanas with an extra set of limbs. They can’t turn human, but they can hide in your basement. But everything is fine, right?
Shadow Scale
Second of the Seraphina duology, set a few months after the events of Seraphina.
Seraphina, having been forced to tell the truth about herself in order to save her friends, sets out across the Southlands, Porphyry, and the Tanamoot, to find the other half-dragons and stop a war. If only they were all on the same side.
Tess of the Road
First of Tess’s duology, set a few years after the events of Seraphina.
Tess is Seraphina’s fully-human half-sister. This book began with the question: What if your older sibling, by the time she was your age, had saved the world? Would you feel like a fuck-up? What if, on top of all that, you really kind of were a fuck-up? What do you do when you’re not even eighteen yet, and you feel like your life is already ruined? Tess walks all the way across the Southlands to get back to herself.
In the Serpent’s Wake
Second of Tess’s duology, set immediately after the events of Tess of the Road.
Tess, having figured out how to be the hero of her own story, feels very inspired to run out and be the hero of other people’s stories as well. That goes about as well as you’d think. However, the world is a very big place, and this story doesn’t just belong to Tess. A dashing countess, a failed priest, and a genderqueer dragon are all on parallel paths–the paths that lead to figuring out how to do good in a complicated world.
Coming soon: Among Ghosts
A stand-alone novel set about a hundred years before Seraphina. Dragons and humans are at war, but Samsam has made a separate peace.
Cover art coming soon!
Short Stories:
At The Sunday Morning Transport:
The Sunday Morning Transport is a curated short-story newsletter, delivering delight to your inbox every Sunday morning. They’ve published two of my short stories so far:
Ghost Story (Feb. 2023), set a couple centuries before Seraphina, during a particularly devastating dragon war.
Father Ash (July, 2024), retelling of a Goreddi folktale.
At My Patreon, Fake Folktales:
An ongoing labour of love for almost two years now, Fake Folktales has accumulated an extensive archive of Goreddi folktales, ranging from silly to sorrowful. Come for the stories, stay for the bickering archivists on our Folkloric Arts Research Team. A good time will be had by all!
A free sample to whet the appetite: The Haunted Duck
Rachel Hartman 