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Cover of After the Dragons by Cynthia Zhang

After the Dragons

Cynthia Zhang

In polluted near-future Beijing, a dragon rescuer and a medical researcher connect over tiny dragons and a fatal lung disease.

First published 2021

Review Score: 83%

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The Story

In near-future Beijing, tiny dragons roam the city as the heat, drought, and pollution worsen everyday life. A mysterious lung disease called shaolong threatens humans, while the dragons themselves struggle to survive in the altered environment.

Kai, a college student cut off from others by his diagnosis, spends his days rescuing abandoned dragons from the streets. Eli, a biracial American medical researcher drawn to Beijing by family memory and grief, arrives to study the disease and learns the city through its dragons and Kai.

As the two begin working together, their tentative connection deepens into a slow-burn romance. Their partnership brings them face to face with illness, family, identity, and the limits of what any one person can fix in a damaged world.

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