K Arsenault Rivera

1 universe Last reviewed 2026-08-26

K Arsenault Rivera is an American author of fantasy fiction, born in Mayagüez, Puerto Rico, and relocated to New York as a toddler. An avid participant in tabletop and live-action roleplaying communities, Rivera has drawn directly on that experience in crafting fiction, and has worked managing a nutritional supplement store in Brooklyn, where she currently lives with her partner. Her debut novel, The Tiger's Daughter, the first book in the Their Bright Ascendency series, introduces an epic fantasy world inspired by East Asian and steppe cultures and follows the intertwined destinies of two women bound together across an empire-spanning conflict. The novel and its sequels are noted for their unconventional structure, framing much of the narrative as a letter written by one protagonist to the other, and for centering a queer romantic relationship at the heart of a large-scale epic fantasy story. Rivera's writing draws heavily on her background in collaborative storytelling gained through roleplaying, lending her prose a strong sense of voice and character interiority uncommon in traditional epic fantasy. Her work has been praised for expanding the genre's representation of both cultural settings beyond conventional European-inspired fantasy and of queer relationships as central rather than peripheral narrative elements.

Universe(s)

Books

• The Tiger's Daughter (2017) · Their Bright Ascendency Core Canon
• The Phoenix Empress (2018) · Their Bright Ascendency Core Canon
• The Warrior Moon (2021) · Their Bright Ascendency Core Canon

Aggregate across all universes

• Total Core Canon books across all universes: 3 books
• Award recognitions across all universes: 0 (None recorded)

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