The Sword of Kaigen

The Sword of Kaigen is a fantasy novel by the American writer M. L. Wang, published in 2019. It is set in a world built on Japanese history and martial tradition rather than on the European middle ages.

The story takes place in a village on the Kusanagi Peninsula, where the Yanagi family and their neighbours have for generations trained their sons to be the empire's defenders against the invaders from the north. Misaki is the woman who married into the family, gave up the career she was good at and now runs a household under her mother-in-law, and Mamoru is her eldest son, who is being trained in the family's ice technique and who has begun to question what he is being taught. When the invasion they have been prepared for finally arrives, the fighting is at the village rather than at the border, and the novel follows the battle and its aftermath rather than stopping at the victory. Wang wrote it as a standalone novel, and its attention is on family life and the cost of a martial tradition as much as on the combat.

The book was published by a small press and became widely read through recommendation, and the author's other work is set in a different world.