A Throne Betrayed
Title and cover revealed for the first novel in the epic Clan Wars series!
“Something is broken in the Empire. It began with the Emperor’s death, yes, but that is not all.”
Thirty years ago, the saga of Legend of the Five Rings began with the release of the original collectible card game. Over the intervening three decades, the Emerald Empire of Rokugan has been explored through games, books, comics, video games, and more. The Legend of the Five Rings is a setting driven by narrative, and central to that narrative over its thirty-year history has been the story of the Clan Wars, the age of turmoil and catastrophe triggered by the murder of the Emperor Hantei 38th.
And now the saga of the Clan Wars is to be told like never before in a brand-new series of epic fantasy novels beginning this summer from Aconyte Books. First announced at Gen Con in 2023, today we can reveal the title and the cover for the first book in the series, A Throne Betrayed, by New York Times bestselling author Julie Kagawa and J.T. Nicholas, with a cover from longstanding L5R artist Mauro Dal Bo. This first volume in the epic Clan Wars series is due to be published August 2025.
A Throne Betrayed will take readers to Rokugan in the aftermath of the Emperor’s murder, as the rōnin Toturi, formerly the Emperor’s Emerald Champion, and others fight to save what they can of the Emerald Empire while around them the Great Clans are consumed by ambition.
Julie Kagawa is the New York Times bestselling author of the Iron Fey, Blood of Eden, Talon, and Shadow of the Fox series, plus many more titles besides. She was born in Sacramento, California, grew up in Hawaii, and now lives in Kentucky.
J.T. Nicholas is the author of the science fiction novels Stolen Earth and ReCoil, and the neo-noire science fiction series, The New Lyons Sequence. He was born in Lexington, Virginia, before moving to Germany as a military brat, the first of some thirty relocations. He currently resides in Kentucky.
Both are long-time L5R fans and together have worked to bring the definitive portrayal of these opening stages of the Clan Wars to life. We’ll be bringing news and previews about this epic new series between now and the book’s release. Sign up to the L5R.com newsletter to make sure you never miss a thing.
