Travis interviews author Yoon Ha Lee about Phoenix Extravagant, his latest novel from Solaris Books. This standalone story follows a nonbinary painter as they team up with a pacifist mecha dragon against an evil empire, and it takes place in a magical version of Korea during the Japanese occupation.

Yoon and Travis discuss Yoon’s experience with watercolor and animation, the important role of art in culture, and how colonization seeks to undermine and destroy that role.

About Yoon Ha Lee:

A Korean-American sf/f writer who received a B.A. in math from Cornell University and an M.A. in math education from Stanford University, Yoon finds it a source of continual delight that math can be mined for story ideas. Yoon’s novel Ninefox Gambit won the Locus Award for best first novel, and was a finalist for the Hugo, Nebula, and Clarke awards; its sequels, Raven Stratagem and Revenant Gun, were also Hugo finalists. His middle grade space opera Dragon Pearl won the Locus Award for best YA novel and was a New York Times bestseller. Yoon’s short fiction has appeared in publications such as F&SF, Tor.com, and Clarkesworld Magazine, as well as several year’s best anthologies.

You can find Yoon on Dreamwidth, on Twitter as @deuceofgears, and on Instagram as @deuceofgears. You can find his art at deuceofgears.com and his music at soundcloud.com/deuceofgears.

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Music:

• Intro: “Beyond the Wide World” courtesy of Yoon Ha Lee
• Outro: “Shadow’s End” courtesy of Yoon Ha Lee

The blog post accompanying this episode can be found at https://thefantasyinn.com, along with fantasy book reviews, author interviews, and more fantasy content.