The Cloud Roads: Volume One of the Books of the Raksura

Moon has spent his life hiding what he is - a shape-shifter able to transform himself into a winged creature of flight. An orphan with only vague memories of his own kind, Moon tries to fit in among the tribes of his river valley, with mixed success. Just as Moon is once again cast out by his adopted tribe, he discovers a shape-shifter like himself... someone who seems to know exactly what he is, who promises that Moon will be welcomed into his community. What this stranger doesn't tell Moon is that his presence will tip the balance of power... that his extraordinary lineage is crucial to the colony's survival... and that his people face extinction at the hands of the dreaded Fell! Now Moon must overcome a lifetime of conditioning in order to save himself... and his newfound kin.

Martha Wells is the author of fourteen fantasy novels, including The Wizard Hunters, The Ships of Air, The Gate of Gods, The Element of Fire, and the Nebula-nominated The Death of the Necromancer. Her newest novel, The Cloud Roads, was published in March 2011 by Night Shade Books, and the sequel, The Serpent Sea, in January 2012. Her next fantasy novels will be The Siren Depths, to be published by Night Shade in December 2013, and Emilie and the Hollow World, to be published by Strange Chemistry Books in April 2013. She has had short stories in the magazines Black Gate, Realms of Fantasy, Lone Star Stories, and Stargate Magazine, and in the Tsunami Relief anthology Elemental. She has also written two media-tie-in novels, Stargate Atlantis: Reliquary and Stargate Atlantis: Entanglement.