---

Before the Coffee Gets Cold

(By Toshikazu Kawaguchi)

A small back alley cafe in Tokyo that’s been operating for as many years as most of the people who’ve known about it can remember offers more than just coffee and something to eat, it can let you travel back in time. 

But there’s a catch, or many catches, there’re so many rules to time travel in this mystical cafe that most who come to go back in time never do. IN the four short stories in Before the Coffee Gets Cold readers see four people take the risk to go back in time to be able to do one last thing, even if it won’t change the future. 

This book puts forth the question: what would you do if you could go back in time? Even if you can’t change the future outcome, would you still do it? These four short stories beautifully deliver the message of emotional change, confronting your past, and finding a moment of peace that had been lost. 

---

Daughter of the Moon Goddess

(By Sue Lynn Tan)

Xingyin is the Daughter of the Moon Goddess, living alone with her mother and their friend for her entire life. Life on the moon is peaceful but there are things that Xingyin isn’t allowed to know, or do. Reaching out to the flickers of light she sees in her mind is one of those things, and when she does do it one day it changes everything. 

Suddenly her mother is in danger of being executed by the Celestial Empress who has mysterious grudge on poor Chang’e who spends her night staring wistfully at the mortal world below and now Xingyin finds herself crash landing in the very place that could kill both of them in her attempt to escape with her life -The Celestial Realm. 

By some odd fate Xingyin is now the Crown Prince’s playmate, someone who studies, trains, practices magic, and adventures with the son of the very people who wish to kill her own mother, all while she desperately keeps her true identity a secret. 

When an opportunity arises for Xingyin to free her mother by her own merit she lunges at it, just as her heart is broken in two by the realization that she could never be with the boy she loves. 

Perilous quests, impossible twists, a plot unknown to everyone, and a romance that blooms despite all odds. The Daughter of the Moon Goddess is a beautiful continuation of the classic Chinese Mythology that brings new life to the story and its characters. 

---

The Eyes and The Impossible

(By Dave Eggers)

Johannes is the fastest, bestest, most amazing and clever dog that ever runs so swiftly through the park. He is even better because he is a free dog, one without leashes, silly coats, or humans to bother him. Johannes is the eyes, he uses his swift speed and brilliant wit to watch over the park and report everything back to the three ancient Bison who ensure everything runs smoothly, this is a job that Johannes takes very seriously. 

But nothing stays the same forever, for better or worse. Soon the park has more humans, ones who cause havoc and too many problems, there’s a strange new building that goes up filled with mysterious rectangles that threaten to make Johannes a kept dog, and new creatures that cause everything Johannes ever knew to seem impossibly small. 

---

 Gwen and Art Aren’t In Love

(By Lex Croucher)

Gwen and Art are not Queen Gueniviere and King Arthur, but they are a princess and young lord named after them in hopes of sparking the same romance that the two had in their countries’ mythical history. Gwen and Art have been engaged since childhood, and they’ve both hated each other since. 

But now with war on the horizon, the two’s coming of age, approaching they don’t really have a choice but to get along, especially when they both discover the other’s secret.

Gwen wants nothing more than to spend her days with her crush, the only female knight, Bridget Leclair, while Arthur has been trying to find the love of his life with tryist after tryist with boys from every background. With both of their secret affairs in full swing the two try to make nice in order to help each other with their actual love lives, all while fooling the court into thinking that they’re heads over heels with each other.

This cute queer romance novel takes a quick twist and turn into adventure and chilling secrets that may topple the budding romance that Gwen and Art face, but can they overcome the war on the horizon, a court’s expectations, all while finding true love? 

---

 Six Crimson Cranes

(By Elizabeth Lim)

Shiori’anma is the only daughter of seven children to the King of Kiata and his late wife. She spends her days trying to mess around with her brothers like they did before the six of them grew up and became boring proper princes while also trying to avoid her looming engagement that threatens to take her away from her home and family. Shiori’s stepmother, Raikama, is not helping matters, especially when she discovers her stepdaughter’s forbidden secret, that Shiori has magic, a power and practice so forbidden in Kiata that it would result in her banishment.

To make things truly worse, when Shiori discovers that her stepmother is an evil witch set on destroying her kingdom and father, she ends up getting her and her brothers cursed when she tries to warn them. 

Now her six brothers are doomed to spend their days as Cranes, slowly losing their minds to the birds whose form they possess, while Shiori can’t speak lest a worse fate befall her family. 

Will she and her brothers be able to find a way to break Raikama’s curse and save their father and kingdom before it’s too late?