The Jasmine Throne

The Jasmine Throne is an epic fantasy inspired by the history of India, the first book of the Burning Kingdoms trilogy. The empire of Parijatdvipa rules the conquered land of Ahiranya, suppressing its language and its faith, and Ahiranya is dying of the rot, a plague that makes plants grow out of the bodies of the sick. When Emperor Chandra, a religious zealot, takes the throne, his sister Malini refuses to sacrifice herself for his throne. He sends her into exile, imprisoned in the Hirana, a temple in Ahiranya.

Priya is a servant in the household of the regent, General Vikram. She is also one of the few surviving temple children, and she has powers she keeps hidden. When she saves Malini from an assassin and becomes her attendant, the two women are drawn together, first as wary allies and then as lovers, each torn between the other and her own people. Around them move Priya's brother Ashok, who leads a violent resistance and wants the deathless waters within the temple for his fighters; Bhumika, the regent's wife and another surviving temple child, who has the regent executed and takes control of Ahiranya; and the princes plotting to replace Chandra. Priya and Bhumika pass through the deathless waters, Ashok dies trying, and the two women restore Ahiranya's old faith. Malini escapes, and at the end, when Chandra's soldiers come, she burns the temple of the nameless god, killing the soldiers, and is proclaimed empress.

This is a big, slow book, and the first chapters ask you to learn an empire, two religions and a large cast before the story takes hold. Readers who stay find a romance full of distrust and a hard look at what power costs the people who seize it. Publishers Weekly called it a "spellbinding epic fantasy" while warning that its magic and its cast take time to settle into. It suits readers of S. A. Chakraborty and Shelley Parker-Chan.