Giu Yukari (縁) Murakami (村上) is a Japanese-Brazilian fiction author. Born in Pará and granddaughter of Japanese immigrants, her narratives reflect aspects of her Amazonian Brazilian experience and the effects of diasporic immigration in her works. She is the winner of the Fox-Empíreo Literary Prize (2017) and the Uirapuru Prize (2021). Her work has been published in Brazil, the USA, and Japan. In 2025, her short story "Pelas mãos de batchan" (Eita! Magazine) was adapted for audiovisual media by directors Hugo Katsuo and Palm Gurgel through the SESC Pulsar grant in Rio de Janeiro.

Instagram: @giuyukarimurakami

Fernanda Castro is a Brazilian writer and translator with experience in several publishing houses. In addition to the books in her native language, she also featured short stories in magazines such as The Dark and Strange Horizons. She lives in Recife with her husband and a bunch of strange creatures. One of her novels, Mariposa Vermelha, was a finalist for the Prêmio Jabuti, the most prestigious literary award in Brazil.

Instagram: @fernandaversa

Anna Martino is a Brazilian SFF writer, translator and editor, publishing both in English and Portuguese since 2013. Her work in English was featured in magazines such as Strange Horizons, Clarkesworld and GigaNotoSaurus, and was also performed at BBC World Radio. She is the co-founder and current publisher at Dame Blanche, a small press publishing Brazilian speculative fiction since 2016. She lives in São Paulo with her husband and son.

Instagram: @annafagundesmartino

Visible Magic by Fernanda Castro and Giu Yukari Murakami, translated by Anna Martino

"Visible Magic" brings forward the talent of two prize-winning Brazilian writers showing a different side of the country. In "The Last Unicorn in Serrita", the semi-arid backlands of the Northeast is the setting for the chasing of a mythical creature – mixing up mysticism, Catholicism, family lore and the hopes for a better life. In "Flaming Dew", we have a coming-of-age story among the Japanese immigrant colonies in the North of Brazil – where languages, expectations and necessities clash, and magic, visible and invisible, reveal unexpected answers.

CURATOR'S NOTE

These two vibrant stories, translated to English for this bundle, take us into local regions many readers will not be familiar with, and while in them bring us back to the familiar. Again, this is a theme of this collection: that equality is not sameness, and in our deep diversity of experiences and perspectives, there is immeasurable strength. I hope you will enjoy this journey into the rainforest and sertão of Northern Brazil. –E.D.E. Bell

 

REVIEWS

  • "Fernanda Castro's words are exquisitely haunting and mesmerizing. I always make sure I grab her stuff to read right away as soon as it's released. Definitely one of my favorite authors of all time."

    – Renan Bernardo, Nebula award finalist

  • "Giu Yukari Murakami's "Flaming Dew" honours the powerful histories of migration that suffuse the South American continent, and translation by Anna Martino brings the nuance of these fully embodied characters to life for a new audience."

    – writer M. L. Clark
 

BOOK PREVIEW

Excerpt

"You see, dear old mate, this responsibility is a heavy load to carry. It starts in the blood in my veins, in the cowboy legacy of my father and grandfather, and extends through my name. Raimunda. The female version of the name of the man murdered years ago and who, nowadays, is the reason behind this festival. This is not my first time at the Cowboy Mass, much less at the bull chasing. But it may be the most important yet." – from The Last Unicorn in Serrita.

"She bit her lower lip discreetly, feeling the flames course through her veins, remembering her mother's words about the proposal her father had accepted years before. If true, her family still used that curse in the most atrocious way possible. Reika took a deep breath as deeply as she could in that position. She couldn't lose control. She couldn't give them any more reason to fear her power, nor her mother's. She decided to vent her anger by roughly beating the green tea powder next to the boiling water with the bamboo bristles. She wanted to stand up and say a lot to those men, but there was nothing she could do but serve tea." – from Flaming Dew.