What if the stars themselves needed a librarian’s touch?

Mira Solace has always preferred the quiet order of knowledge to the chaos of people. As head night librarian in her college town’s astronomy wing, she finds comfort in cataloguing star charts and tending to delicate telescopes—her world measured in constellations and the silent language of distant suns. But when a mysterious, untitled book appears among a dead professor’s effects—its cover shifting with symbols that seem to pulse and breathe—Mira’s careful routine is shattered. One touch, and she’s swept into a world where stars are forged from dreams, and stories hold the power to reshape reality.

She awakens in Stellareth, a city of living light and impossible architecture, where towers spiral toward a sky ruled by unfamiliar constellations and three pale moons. Here, magic and astronomy are one: star-forgers craft constellations that heal, guide, and protect entire worlds. But Stellareth is in crisis. The city’s ancient knowledge has been lost—star-charts are unreadable, magical texts shift like restless ghosts, and the greatest master-forger, Nareith Solveign, has retreated into guilt and isolation after a catastrophic failure.

Mira’s arrival is no accident. As she navigates the Grand Observatory’s spiraling halls, donning scholar’s robes woven from starlight and learning to read the city’s living script, she discovers that her outsider’s logic and librarian’s instincts may be exactly what Stellareth needs. Guided by Thessa Morlin, an apprentice star-tender with a penchant for cosmic mischief, Mira is drawn into a community of scholars, dreamers, and magical artisans—each struggling to restore what was lost.

But the city’s wounds run deep. Nareith’s last creation, a living constellation meant to heal, instead shattered under the weight of collective grief—its fragments now haunting the city as orphaned star-sprites, beautiful and unstable. As Mira and Nareith’s paths intertwine, their unlikely partnership sparks the first flickers of hope. Together, they discover that healing Stellareth’s magic is not a matter of technique, but of emotional honesty and collaboration. Star-forging, they learn, is as much about heart as it is about knowledge.

Through systematic research and shared vulnerability, Mira and Nareith pioneer a new kind of magic—one that blends librarian logic with the artistry of the stars. Their partnership deepens into something more as they teach others to heal damaged constellations, turning the observatory into a beacon for practitioners across worlds. But as their fame grows, so do new challenges: political opposition, the arrival of an interdimensional delegation from the Grand Archive, and the revelation that Mira’s journey may have been orchestrated by powers with their own designs on the fabric of reality.

When the city’s Master Forge—a crystalline heart that remembers every triumph and trauma—begins to evolve, reaching out to other worlds through song and light, Mira and Nareith must decide what kind of future they want to build. Will they defend their radical new magic against tradition and fear? Can they trust the connection that’s grown between them, or is it just another story written by someone else’s hand?

Ink & Elsewhere: The Librarian and the Star-Forger is a luminous, emotionally rich portal fantasy about found family, the healing power of collaboration, and the courage to claim your place in a world that isn’t quite ready for you. For fans of lyrical worldbuilding, magical academia, and slow-burn romance, this novel invites you to step into a city where every story changes the sky—and where even the quietest librarian can help forge the stars.

Perfect for readers who believe that knowledge is magic, that healing is a communal art, and that the stories we share can bridge worlds.