#nightbarsky

Got my editor's copies of my book today! Aren't they gorgeous? (Ignore the "not for sale" line through the cover- that goes away during publication- and the shitty quality of my camera!) I'm going through the book to make final edits- it really is looking like this book about a sapphic ex-Chosen One (gotta love an unlikable lady protag) falling for her rival is going to be able to go up for y'all by the end of March.

(Also face reveal? I guess? None of y'all care about that, but I will be one of those annoying parents who poses with my kids, aka my characters.)

Which means there's only one real question: do y'all want me to post the playlists for the characters/ships here as a lead-up to the book coming out?

Do you like Carry On or NBC's Community? Do you like messy lesbians in an enemies-to-lovers dynamic? Do you want to know what happens to Chosen Ones after they defeat their villain? Do you wish for a version of Harry Potter that isn't transphobic, homophobic, antisemitic, and racist? (Did you enjoy the seventy million fics I wrote about the mentors coping with the aftermath of the Hunger Games?) Do you like messy background poly bisexuals?

Well, here it is, y'all: all of the edits are done and my book baby has been published! Rachel and Daiyu are finally here for y'all to meet! I'm ordering my own copies now (and will definitely update y'all with photos when they arrive, especially now that I can get a photo with BOTH of my books), but for now, I just wanted to give y'all the link so you can check it out. I'm going to put the blurb below to those who are confused as to what this might be!

Amazon.com: This Rotten Work: 9798879537734: Jenkins, Kenna: Books

The moment Chosen One Rachel Barsky finally kills her magical high school’s evil Headmaster, she’s out. No pressure, no politics, and certainly no more death tournaments for her. She ditches the Magical Realm for a far more chill Normie community college with her two best friends, determined to finally get some blessed peace and quiet—maybe even a good nap. It’s what she deserves after giving up her teenage years to a prophecy that nearly killed her more times than she can count.

But of course Rachel can’t catch a break. Her first day of classes, tragedy arrives on campus in the form of Daiyu Nightbane, Rachel’s archrival and the annoyingly attractive daughter of the now-dead Headmaster. Daiyu’s acting suspiciously normal, Rachel is pissed, and her friends are preaching forgiveness and peace. What gives?

Rachel expects to have to grit her teeth and soldier through the annoyance of her rival haunting her early retirement, but she quickly learns that expectations are never made to last. After an explosive duel that ends up with one of them knocked off of their feet, Rachel is forced to see a kinder side of Daiyu than she ever glimpsed during high school.

Over a school year filled with Shakespeare, lightning magic, and quite a lot of kosher BBQ, Rachel finds herself toppling head-over-heels into an unlikely romance with her rival while she struggles with nightmares, grief, and lingering questions from her high school years. Is it possible to finally make a life for herself? Can the Chosen One really have a happy ending with the golden girl that ruled the school?

---

As @evelynhug0 so kindly requested, I'm going to release each of the main character playlists (and one for the main ship, Rachel and Daiyu) once a week leading up to the release of the book!

First up is Rachel Barsky, my beloved lesbian ex-Chosen One with anger management issues and lots of heart. After killing the evil Headmaster of her magical high school, she's doing her best to settle into normalcy at Normie community college by living with her two best friends, Zell and Stebbie, cooking a lot of Kosher BBQ, and attending history and theater classes. (She's a self-admitted drama queen, what can she say?) There's just one problem: her annoyingly attractive rival, Daiyu, shows up on the first day of classes, and Rachel's instinct to shoot lightning first and ask questions later is going to get everyone into a whole heap of trouble.

Here's a sample of her character description:

"Yep, that's me: a face full of freckles and close-set brown eyes full of ghosts. A head of frizzy blonde curls only able to be tamed when pulled into fishtail braids and a nose that’s a bit too big and pinched and a mouth that’s too loud for anyone save Zell and Stebbie. A chunk of the top of my left ear missing thanks to a fire blast from Daiyu in the Tournament. Medium height, medium build, only muscles coming from a lifetime of running and years of reluctant dueling training I got after school. A girl who was born during one hurricane and who lost her parents in another.

I make sense in this household of misfits and dreamers, kids who are a little too strange to fit in right."

As @evelynhug0 so kindly requested, I'm going to release each of the main character playlists (and one for the main ship, Rachel and Daiyu) once a week leading up to the release of the book!

Second up is Daiyu Nightbane, our dear archrival of the main character draped in fire symbolism, severely repressed sapphic feelings, and a whole lot of trauma (aka the lesbian Baz Pitch or Henry Fox-Mountchristen-Windsor of this story). The "fell first" part of the "she fell first, but she fell harder" equation, she is the daughter of the evil Headmaster of their magical school but had to repress that shit deep because the very person her father was replacing her with as his heir is the very Chosen One that she has a crush on, but that Chosen One is Rachel, aka a girl, and that is very much a no-go. Daiyu just wants to live a normal life, enjoying Shakespeare and coffee (her two favorite parts of the Normie world), but plenty of people see her as a bargaining chip or want her to atone for her father's actions. Oh, and Rachel would rather fight her than give her the time of day.

As Rachel describes her in Chapter 15:

"Daiyu's sitting on the window seat, staring out over the cityscape. Her hand is casually flung over her knees, mug clasped in her fingers. The streetlight outside the window throws dim, orange light over her features, illuminating the red rimming her eyes. I can smell something stiff sloshing about in that cup, something that closely resembles the bottle of vodka in my nightstand. Maybe the huangjiu, maybe something stronger. In Daiyu’s free hand, hanging by her side, tiny fire sylphs dance, little yellow flames throwing flickering shadows across her face.

By HaShem, she is gorgeous.

Despite the solemnity in her expression, she’s so beautiful. She was called the golden light of the Rising Sun, and that title wasn’t wrong. Even without her spangled red robes or gold ruqun, even without her crown, she is captivating, elegance and allure arrayed about her. Her posture is perfect, her spine lined by power and strength, even in Normie clothes with a half-working wand."