A Queen Disgraced: Afterword

What did you think? I hope you enjoyed it. My previous two-part novel Kingdom Conquered by the Golden Dragon was received pretty well, so I tried to write a similar novel here. It takes place in the same world, but it is not a sequel since all of the main characters are different. (If you enjoyed this one, please read Golden Dragon too. I wrote them so it doesn’t matter which one you read first.) You can think of it like a story about Takeda Shingen and one about Mouri Motonari. They both lived during the Warring States period, but they were active in such different parts of Japan that they rarely had any effect on each other’s strategies.

Now for a neat secret about this book. The protagonists were of course Queen Malicia and Strategist Selune, but it actually had a hidden protagonist. No, not Vishnu – Karura the ninja. You see, when I was trying to come up with a plot, my editor Okada-san requested a scene where a kunoichi was taken prisoner and sexually tortured. I came up with three plot suggestions based on that and this was the accepted one.

In other words, this was the story I came up with when asked to have a ninja tortured. Karura would not exist if not for that cruel editor using the nebulous idea of “what the readers want” as an excuse to get his own desires written. (Now, I’m a nice guy myself, so it pains me to see her born for that sole purpose.) On the other hand, there is Court Magician Ralmesel. In the initial plot outline, that mystical beauty was to have all sorts of things happen to her and it would not have been pretty, but in the final product, she doesn’t do all that much. She ended up being a minor character without even an illustration. (But would you consider that a blessing in disguise given the alternative?)

Finally, I must thank Senbata Rou-san for doing the illustrations again, my editors Okada-san and Satou-san, all of you readers, and especially the delinquent literary girls and young women who had the courage to buy a porn novel like this. Why do I specifically mention them? I was told Golden Dragon was actually fairly popular among high school girls, although I still find that hard to believe. I imagine they were tricked into it by Senbata Rou-san’s lovely art. In fact, I myself once bought a shoujo novel after being drawn to the cover art. I ended up loving it, became a fan of the author, ordered every book they had released, and immediately buy every new release of theirs I see in the bookstore. (What’s my point with that anecdote? That I would love to have some passionate fans like that.)