Water Moon

A Filipino author based in Manila, Samantha Sotto Yambao is known for her works of fantasy and magical realism. Her titles include Before Ever After (2011), Love and Gravity (2017), A Dream of Trees (2019), The Beginning of Always (2022), and Water Moon (2025).

In all five of Yambao’s novels, she combines elements of magic and adventure to explore complex themes about the human experience. In Before Ever After, the main character, Shelley, sets out on an adventure to find her husband, Max, who she believed was dead, after “an Italian editor of American coffee table books” informs her that Max is his living grandfather (“Before Ever After.” Samantha Sotto Yambao). The novel traces her adventures through time as she “relives Max’s stories of bloody Parisian barricades, medieval Austrian kitchens, and buried Roman boathouses” (“Before Ever After”). In Love and Gravity, “a young Isaac Newton falls in love with a girl living in modern-day San Francisco” (“Love and Gravity.” Samantha Sotto Yambao). The proverbially star-crossed lovers must choose which era to live in and what they’re willing to sacrifice to be together.

In A Dream of Trees, the main character, Shiori Ametsuchi (a Bonsai artist), wakes up one morning with no recollection of her past life.