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From the author of The Black Tides of Heaven and The Genesis of Misery comes a new novella, Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame, a queer, Asian-inspired fantasy about a dragon slayer who is forced to reconsider her nature when she is sent to save a dragon-worshipping country from the threat of war.
In my article New Books of 2025: 5 New Releases to be Excited About in 2025, I talked briefly about this upcoming novella and how excited I was to get my hands on it. I’ll say the same thing now as I did then. This novel has dragons, lady knights, and lesbians. What more could anyone ask for?
Although I do have my criticisms of Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame, it was a very enjoyable reading experience. The worldbuilding was excellent, it was short but emotionally satisfying, and the plot-twist was easy to guess but created a sense of dramatic irony that enhanced the stakes of the relationships between the characters. I would recommend this novella to anyone who enjoys stories about characters healing from the trauma they have endured over the course of their lives because, while there were a lot of things to love about Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame, Yeva’s healing journey was the star of the show.
With that being said, let’s get into the details.
Unmasking the dragon slayer
Yeva, the renowned guildknight of Mithrandon, the famous dragon slayer with the gift of blue fire in her blood, hasn’t taken off her armor in public since the day she earned it.
“She will remain within this shell of leather and metal forevermore. No more shall she suffer the judgement of others who will look into her face and find it lacking. No more shall she seem like an interloper, an unworthy stranger squatting within the holiest walls of the Sun Empire. From this day on, people should look at her and see nothing but a faithful servant of Mithrandon, pure in ability and beyond reproach.” (Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame, Neon Yang)
Her armor has defended her against more than just the claws and teeth of the dragons she hunts. Within her armor she is safe from the prying eyes of those who would disregard her for her sex, shun her for the ambiguity of her heritage and judge her abilities from the state of her crippled hand. Yeva’s armor is so much more than just armor. It is a safe haven. A coping mechanism. Even a weapon to be used against those who would misjudge or undervalue her. Within her armor, she isn’t Yeva. She is the masked guildknight of Mithrandon. Nothing more.
Throughout Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame, we see Yeva struggle with the identity she has created for herself as a means of survival within the walls of Mithrandon. As she spends more and more time in Quanbao, with the beautiful and mysterious girl-king Sookhee, the pieces of her armor begin to feel more like a prison than a haven and she soon finds it easy to shed them off, piece by piece.
Almost too easy.
While I love the concept and Yeva’s journey to discover her identity, I found that Yeva was too quick to give in to the pressure she was feeling to shed her armor. I think a lot of this comes from the fact that this is a novella and the story has to progress quickly, but I still found it mildly unbelievable that she would spend less than a week in Quanbao and be willing to relinquish the safety of her armor.
Yeva has spent almost half her life building up this persona and hiding behind both the armor and reputation she has crafted. Her armor is a tool, a crutch, a lifeline to surviving Mithrandon as a disabled woman with the gift of their people in her blood but the skin of someone who doesn’t belong.
And while I understand why she finally decides to step outside her armor, not only to appear more diplomatic and amenable to Quanbao’s way of life, but also as an act of breaking free and returning to her cultural roots, it just feels too fast. Too easy for a woman who hardly knows how to function outside the protection of her armor. For someone who has forgotten everything about the person she once was before it, including her own native language.
Regardless of the timing, it is a gorgeous metaphor and the transformation within Yeva as she begins to recover from the gentle ethnic cleansing of her life in Mithrandon and return to a version of herself that could have existed if she had never become a guildknight.
The death of the guildknight, the birth of Yeva
While the unveiling of the guildknight felt off-kilter to me, the death of the guildknight was absolutely perfect.
“Her hands shake as she puts the helmet back over her head. Yeva has forgotten how dark it was within its metal confines, how echoey and distorted. She feels like a stranger in her own body.” (Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame, Neon Yang)
Yeva is changed. No longer is she the obedient guildknight. No longer is she the hollowed-out version of herself, a hunk of metal in the shape of something that resembles her. Too long did she fill the void within herself with duty and conformity to an empire that used her for her gift, that knew nothing of the woman beneath the armor.
So when she has to make a choice between duty and love, between following orders and following her heart, we know the choice she is going to make.
Yang doesn’t hide anything from the reader, doesn’t make them guess at their character’s intentions, or even work too hard to figure out the plot-twist. Yang gives us all the information we need to know right in the first few chapters. So, when Lady Sookhee, the girl-king of a country that worships dragons, who are rumored to be able to take the form of humans, falls mysteriously ill once every month, it is easy to jump to conclusions.
Although the big reveal was easy to guess, this did not hurt the plot at all. In fact, it only added to the dramatic irony of it. The dragon slayer and the girl-dragon, falling in love. And we know Yeva is inevitably going to have to make a choice, between Sookhee and her life in Mithrandon.
“At this moment, at this twilight, she is allowed to take a new form–not just the valiant guildknight of the Sun Empire, not the faithful servant whose only purpose is to wield a blade, not the faceless, nameless creature who exists only as a terror and whispered legend. She lets herself be so exposed, yet does not feel vulnerable.” (Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame, Neon Yang)
Yeva has shed the armor of the guildknight and grown comfortable in her own skin, in the woman that she is. She has just started accepting herself for who she is and healing from the trauma of her childhood. To stuff herself back into the armor would be to kill herself all over again. So she doesn’t. She kills the guildknight instead.
There is so much beauty in the fact that after she had convinced Emory to bring news of her death to the Sun Emperor, she doesn’t even have to hide herself. She can live freely and true to herself. No one knew the real her. No one in Mithrandon would be able to recognize her face, even if she were standing right in front of them. She can finally become the person she was meant to be. It is the perfect ending for Yeva. The famed guildknight of Mithrandon truly did die in Quanbao, and Yeva was reborn.
Politics and love, can a novella do both?
Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame is not just a love story. There’s also politics and conflict and a war threatening to break loose between the Sun Empire and Quanbao. But, can a story of just 176 pages do it all?
My short answer is yes, Yang creates a fully fleshed out story from the day Yeva discovers her powers to the moment she decides to give up her life as a guildknight and remain in Quanbao with Sookhee. I understand her motivations, the conflict, and her struggle to reconcile what she is comfortable with with what she knows is right.
My more complicated answer is that the conflict was resolved too easily. While it isn’t the resolution that bothers me, I have a hard time believing that things should have gone as smoothly for Yeva and Sookhee, especially when attempting to deceive a seemingly power-hungry emperor, just waiting for the chance to bring war to Quanbao’s door. It’s not that their happy ending couldn’t exist, it’s that it felt too easy to achieve.
An example that drives home this point is Emory’s character. When he arrives in Quanbao, it is evident to Yeva that he is too prepared, having come armed to the teeth with both strategy and weapons. He must have been planning for war for sometime now. This is, of course, a betrayal, but it also seems to go against everything we know about him. This is the same man who sent Yeva to Quanbao, alone, instead of an entourage of soldiers, in an attempt to keep peace. And then, after bringing violence into the heart of Quanbao, he agrees to help Yeva deceive the Sun Emperor in more ways than one.
Of course, characters are supposed to be complex and their motivations can not always be so easy to define, but Emory came off as more ambiguous than complicated. If more time had been taken to explore his character, his behavior and decisions may have been more believable.
In this way, I struggle with books that straddle the line between action and comfort. Yeva’s story and transformation is beautiful, but because this was a novella-length story with an emphasis on both politics and Yeva’s internal struggle, it ended up falling short in some areas.
Final thoughts
Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame falls under the category of novellas I wish had been a full novel, and I mean that in the most positive sense. I would have loved more. More time as a guildknight, more time breaking down the armor, more time learning to love and being loved in return. More time to fully flesh out every aspect of the plot and characters. I love the story here and I truly think it would have made for an amazing novel.
Regardless of my criticisms, I would still very much recommend this book to my friends and readers alike, and hope that anyone who is drawn to Yeva’s story will give Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame a chance.
Thank you to NetGalley and Tor Publishing Group for a copy of an eARC in exchange for an honest review. Brighter than Scale, Swifter than Flame by Neon Yang comes out May 6th, 2025.
