Cat Aquino (they/them) is the twenty-seven-year-old writer of Champion of the Rose, an anti-colonial young adult fantasy manga series co-created and illustrated by Dominique Duran, forthcoming from VIZ Originals, VIZ Media on July 14, 2026.

Granted the Otherwise Award fellowship for excellence in writing gender in speculative fiction, their stories and research have been published by Strange Horizons, Routledge, Berghahn Books, and other Southeast Asian literary magazines. Born and raised in Manila, they moved to Glasgow, Aarhus, Barcelona, and Madrid to finish an Erasmus Mundus International Master’s degree with a distinction in Children’s Literature, Media and Culture. They currently edit fantasy, science fiction, horror novels, and graphic novels for teens and adults at Daphne Press, a #1 Sunday Times bestselling independent publisher.

Cat lives between Manila and London, but is often wandering around Europe and Southeast Asia.

Photo by JJ Agcaoili