The Last Dragoners of Bowbazar

The Last Dragoners of Bowbazar is a 2023 fantasy novella by Indian author Indra Das, published by Subterranean Press and winner of the British Fantasy Award for Best Novella. Set in the author's native Calcutta, it follows Ru, a boy uncertain of his identity and his family's origins, whose parents claim descent from wandering nomads while their household keeps its secrets close.

Blending magical realism with quiet coming-of-age drama, the story threads Ru's ordinary life in the Bowbazar district and his friendship with a girl named Alice against fragments of an impossible world glimpsed in dreams, where humans sail an endless ocean on the backs of divine, dragon-like beasts. The novella explores belonging, cultural displacement, memory, and queer identity through Das's lyrical prose.

At roughly 120 pages, it is a compact, atmospheric work praised for its emotional restraint and imaginative depth.