Red City is a dark and deadly contemporary fantasy of magical warfare, star-crossed ambition, and the pursuit of perfection at any cost, set in a glittering alternate Los Angeles.

In a world ruled by the rich and powerful, alchemy is the secret art of transformation, used by crime syndicates to create a drug called sand. Sand is priceless—it turns people into enhanced versions of themselves and is sold to the wealthy elite, and the ability to create Sand is highly coveted and guarded. In Angel City, two rival syndicates—Grand Central and Lumines—fight for control of alchemy, existing in a balance that threatens to tip at any second.

That balance shatters when two childhood best friends, Sam and Ari, end up on opposite sides in this alchemically-driven fight. Sam, raised by a struggling single mother, desperately joins Grand Central in hopes of changing her life for the better, and Ari, taken from his family when young, has become a rising force within the Lumines. Once close, these two friends have become foes—and now their paths collide in a growing war where ambition, betrayal, and transformation come at a deadly cost.