Chimi and the Thirsty Tree

THE PREMISE (so nobody gets lost). Chimi is a sharp-tongued, extremely tired young woman from a rural village near Punakha, Bhutan, whose main hobbies are hauling firewood, arguing with her mother, and avoiding her mother's plans to marry her off to the neighbor's son, Ugyen, who once tried to fight a cow. One ordinary firewood-gathering afternoon, Chimi finds a cave she's never noticed before. Inside is not a cave. It is the front door of Lhayul, a hidden realm entirely powered by magic, where nobody has ever grown a vegetable, dug a ditch or touched dirt on purpose because why would you, when you can just conjure dinner. Unfortunately, Lhayul's World Tree, Sonam, the tree, every spell, season, and soul in the realm is anchored to, is dying. The realm's finest wizards have tried everything: blessing it, singing to it, arguing with it, casting increasingly elaborate spells at it. Nobody has tried watering it. Nobody has tried soil. Enter Chimi:a woman who has never cast a spell...

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