Siren Queen

A young Chinese-American girl, whose parents run a laundry in a magical Los Angeles, resolves to become a movie star. Achieving stardom, in this Hollywood, involves a literal apotheosis that grants immortality. After a series of bit parts for the director Jacko Dewalt, she blackmails him to meet the studio executive Oberlin Wolfe. To avoid revealing her real name (and thus making herself magically vulnerable), she takes her sister's name, Luli.

Luli joins Wolfe's studio system, on the condition that her roles will include "no maids, no funny talking, no fainting flowers." These conditions limit her career. She befriends her roommate in the studio dorms, a kidnapped Skogsrå named Greta. She also begins a romance with the more-established actress Emmaline Sauvignon. Greta falls in love with Wolfe's protégé Brandt Hiller, whom Wolfe intends to sacrifice in that year's ritualistic Wild Hunt, through which Wolfe feeds a dangerous ancient power. Eventually, Luli lands a major role as a siren. She befriends her famous co-star Harry Long, who reveals to her his secret relationship with a man. Luli's siren movie is a hit, as is its sequel. Greta (now pregnant) and Luli rescue Brandt during the Wild Hunt, and he and Greta escape to Sweden. Emmaline rejects Luli, angry that she drew Wolfe's negative attention.

Two years later, Luli's initial contract with Wolfe is nearly over. While filming the third siren movie, the set catches fire and Harry disappears; he is declared dead. Luli connects with the butch Tara Lubowski at a lesbian bar. Jacko is brought on to direct a hasty re-envisioning of the siren film without Harry in the lead. As Jacko's revenge on Luli for her long-ago blackmail, the film now ends with the siren begging pathetically for her life. Luli is initially angry that Tara (under a male pseudonym) has written this degrading ending, but after she and Tara get to know each other better, they begin a romance. Filming the climactic death scene of her siren, Luli achieves magical stardom. She re-signs with Wolfe from a position of power.

The epilogue is narrated from Luli's perspective as a celestial star in the present day, reflecting on the legacy of her long career and her romantic relationships.

Vo initially wrote a draft of Siren Queen in for a contest run by Angry Robot, which sought novels from writers who didn't yet have agents.^[1] It was the first novel she wrote, although her second novel The Chosen and the Beautiful (2021) would be published before it.^[2] She spent around three months writing.^[3] Despite being rejected in the contest, Vo began sending the draft to agents, and eventually gained representation from Diana Fox.^[4] At the time, it was her longest piece of writing.^[1] Vo described the length as a challenging departure from her early career in short stories, stating, “I work best with boundaries. I love speculative fiction as the genre without limits, but that can be deeply paralyzing sometimes.”^[1] Vo has characterized the first draft of Siren Queen as "three novellas in a trench coat" and credits Fox with guiding its revision into a more unified novel.^[3]

The movies starring Luli's siren are loosely inspired by 1930s horror films and the later Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954).^[2] Other influential movies include Morocco (1930), Shanghai Express (1932), Queen Christina (1933),^[2] and Design for Living (1933).^[5] The characters of Greta and Harry Long are inspired by Greta Garbo and Ramon Novarro.^[4] The Chinese-American star Anna May Wong is mostly reflected in a minor character in the novel, Su Tong Lin, though Wong shares some details of her background with the novel's protagonist Luli.^[2] Another minor character, Louisa Davis, echoes Hattie McDaniel.^[6] In general, these inspirations are loose, with no real films or specific biographical events being dramatized in the novel.^[6][7]

The novel is framed like a memoir, narrated by a future Luli who consciously navigates the differences between truth and memory.^[8] One effect of a retrospective first-person narration, according to Vo, is that it gives readers an implicit assurance that the protagonist will survive the dark events of the novel.^[5] Scenes from movies are also described like Luli's memories, weaving them in to the narrative.^[9] The fantasy elements are introduced without explanation, only gradually building into a distinctive world.^[7][10] A key narrative effect is a feeling of unreality,^[9] or the sense that metaphors are actually real.^[11] These ambiguities contribute to an overall environment of suspense, since the reader is never quite provided enough information to fully understand the dark magic that Luli navigates.^[6] The environment of uncertain, lurking danger has been compared stylistically to the horror writing of Shirley Jackson (1916–1965).^[6]