Sisters

Please add my next novel, Hidden Beauty, to your collection.

The emperor dies, and the imperial consort takes her own life.

The pampered Princess Anning is left orphaned and alone.

The ministers attack her from all sides, claiming that Anning is an impostor who has muddied the royal bloodline and deserves to die.

Her jade hair ornaments sway, her skirts flutter as she stumbles to Shen Li's bedchamber and falls at his knees, pleading, "Imperial Brother, save me!"

Shen Li becomes Anning's greatest support. He prepares her dowry and builds her a residence. Even on the eve of her wedding, when her fiance dies tragically and people curse her as a disastrous star, Shen Li defies the opposition and protects her.

Anning is deeply moved and wants only to repay Shen Li. Then her supposedly dead fiance appears before her.

Only then does she learn that her imperial brother killed their father, and that her fiance nearly died at his hands too. Behind her brother's moon-bright, noble exterior lies a cruel and sinister heart.

Autumn rain falls bleakly, and cicadas cry like mourners.

The Imperial Guards surround the palace until no one can get in or out.

The hand Shen Li once used to grind ink and wet his brush now grips a weapon, and he runs Anning's fiance through with a single stroke.

Shen Li's eyes are bloodshot, yet a smile plays at his lips. He sweeps Anning into his arms and whispers in her ear, "Why are you running? Has your imperial brother not treated you well?"

After Anning is drugged with an aphrodisiac and the two become intimate, Shen Li is consumed by obsession. Whoever Anning is to marry, he kills. Wherever she tries to go, he cuts off her path.

To Shen Li, Anning is the bright moon in the heavens, his only salvation. He will keep her bound to his side, even if it means defying the whole world, and stay with her until death.

Blurb for Hidden Beauty:

Jiang Shu is overjoyed to marry into a prominent family.

That is, until her mother-in-law urges her to continue the Lu family line, leaving her at a loss.

Her husband, the second son of the Lu family, is frail and gravely ill. He can barely manage a single sentence without panting, let alone consummate their marriage.

At first, Jiang Shu merely placates her mother-in-law. But then the older woman threatens that if Jiang Shu still can't have a child, she'll send her back to her parents with a letter of divorce.

In desperation, Jiang Shu trembles as she serves Lu Changji, the Lu family's eldest son, tea laced with an aphrodisiac.

After one night, Jiang Shu is so late that she even misses paying her respects.

As the days grow short and the nights long, Jiang Shu, dark circles under her eyes, negotiates with Lu Changji. "Could you stop coming to see me from now on?"

She'd rather be sent back to her parents than keep spending her days caring for the second son and her nights serving Lu Changji.

When Jiang Shu disappears out of nowhere, the Lu family goes frantic.

In a deep, shadowy chamber, Lu Changji pins Jiang Shu across his thigh and whispers in her ear, "Why are you hiding from me? Without me, how could you continue the Lu family line?"

Theme: Fear no storms; keep moving forward