A wonderfully original story about the true meaning of beauty. I am looking forward to the sequel! C.S. Johnson is trulDelightful, deep, and heartfelt
A wonderfully original story about the true meaning of beauty. I am looking forward to the sequel! C.S. Johnson is truly an author worthy of binging. ...more
I love this series and I love this author. There are only two or three living authors that can get me to hit “download” just by virtue of their name aI love this series and I love this author. There are only two or three living authors that can get me to hit “download” just by virtue of their name and Jennifer is one of them. This is a wonderful middle grade/lower YA series. I’d feel comfortable reading it out loud to my family, but also enjoy the reading myself. Highly recommended!
The plot:
Quick, to the point, and set to a relentless pace, this story doesn’t give you any time to get bored. Interspersed with sweet moments, sarcasm, and banter along with complex moral dilemmas, this book is not only fun, but unexpectedly thought provoking.
What gives you the right to take someone’s life? Is preemptive action ever a good thing? When does the next generation need to take control and when do they need to defer?
The characters:
Savenek, my boy. Ah, he reminds me of my younger brothers in a lot of ways. As the book continued from the last book, the awkward and forced language from his perspective mostly went away, so I really think it’s just a matter of practice. Still, nothing that would stop me from recommending this series. And Ari—oh my precious stabbing queen. Trust Davis to write a noblewoman who’s 100% lady and 100% grit.
Allyssa was hardcore as ever. We get to have a bit of sibling sparring and she and Savenek adjust to one another. While their banter is recognizable to many people, I wished we’d had more time (books) to explore and develop it a bit. All the same, we get closure as Allyssa settles into her place in the court and the empire…and her relationship with Kerdan. OH MY GOSH KERDAN! Yes, I am a huge fan.
The villain(s) in this series present interesting conundrums and we really get more into the political aspect of the setting even more than before.
Recommend this book, recommend this series, recommend everything I’ve read by this author. Already on the “to be read to” list for my future children.
Favorite Quotes
Savenek couldn’t believe he’d lost. To his sister. A woman.
“Explain. I did not like hearing from my men that my woman is being married off.”
“At least we can be hopeless romantics together. That is, when we’re not busy with our spies, assassins, and running the kingdom.”
Merged review:
I love this series and I love this author. There are only two or three living authors that can get me to hit “download” just by virtue of their name and Jennifer is one of them. This is a wonderful middle grade/lower YA series. I’d feel comfortable reading it out loud to my family, but also enjoy the reading myself. Highly recommended!
The plot:
Quick, to the point, and set to a relentless pace, this story doesn’t give you any time to get bored. Interspersed with sweet moments, sarcasm, and banter along with complex moral dilemmas, this book is not only fun, but unexpectedly thought provoking.
What gives you the right to take someone’s life? Is preemptive action ever a good thing? When does the next generation need to take control and when do they need to defer?
The characters:
Savenek, my boy. Ah, he reminds me of my younger brothers in a lot of ways. As the book continued from the last book, the awkward and forced language from his perspective mostly went away, so I really think it’s just a matter of practice. Still, nothing that would stop me from recommending this series. And Ari—oh my precious stabbing queen. Trust Davis to write a noblewoman who’s 100% lady and 100% grit.
Allyssa was hardcore as ever. We get to have a bit of sibling sparring and she and Savenek adjust to one another. While their banter is recognizable to many people, I wished we’d had more time (books) to explore and develop it a bit. All the same, we get closure as Allyssa settles into her place in the court and the empire…and her relationship with Kerdan. OH MY GOSH KERDAN! Yes, I am a huge fan.
The villain(s) in this series present interesting conundrums and we really get more into the political aspect of the setting even more than before.
Recommend this book, recommend this series, recommend everything I’ve read by this author. Already on the “to be read to” list for my future children.
Favorite Quotes
Savenek couldn’t believe he’d lost. To his sister. A woman.
“Explain. I did not like hearing from my men that my woman is being married off.”
“At least we can be hopeless romantics together. That is, when we’re not busy with our spies, assassins, and running the kingdom.”...more
In case the five or so glowy reviews before this had escaped your notice, I am a huge fan of Shreffler’s work. Her other series, The Cat’s Eye ChronicIn case the five or so glowy reviews before this had escaped your notice, I am a huge fan of Shreffler’s work. Her other series, The Cat’s Eye Chronicles, has a coveted seat upon my Shelf of Awesome and when I heard she was working on a book with DRAGONS I went a little spastic. This story manages a huge amount of world building, character building, and emotion in a very short space, something that impressed me greatly even with having read her other pieces. It is a fantastic story, even if it did end in a cliffhanger, and I am very much looking forward to watching the series unfold.
The plot: Everything happens pretty quickly here, which was a nice change for me after a steady diet of epics lately. The plot progresses with only enough world building and description that is necessary (huge plus). My only question issue with this story was Sienna’s empathy toward the dragons. It’s explained, but I wanted to see just a little more expansion of the thought and feeling processes she went through before getting to that point. However, that was my one and only—I wouldn’t even call it a complaint. More like a side note.
It is mentioned somewhere that this has romantic elements, but I would say the focus here was definitely more on the dragons. (And if you have a problem with that, go away.) The general feelings of the populace toward dragons were displayed and justified well in the beginning, but I still found myself sympathizing with the dragons more than the people (which was probably Shreffler’s scheme).
The characters: This doesn’t happen especially often, but the heroine was my favorite character. In the beginning, Sienna is going through that whole awkward “on the threshold of adulthood but has no focus” stage that I think most of us go through. That won her huge doses of empathy and she was relatable and human to me, unlike a lot of fantasy heroines that have been cropping up.
Darius, the dragon hunter, has that whole aura of mystery and awesome about him and I have lots of questions about his character. What did he do that got him made a dragon hunter? Who was he before? Like I said, lots of questions for sequels!
Mistress Ash is probably the other main character and also the villain. Everything about her creeped me out from the moment she turned up and it became clear pretty quickly that I was right about here. She was an excellent villain to this story, written to make you hate her and as far as I was concerned, she could join the chopping block queue with Cerastes and Volcrian (references to The Cat’s Eye Chronicles).
The other characters, mainly those from Sienna’s home castle, reacted in understandable ways, but…no, I’m not going to be rooting for them any time soon. On the other hand, I thought they were remarkably developed for such a short span of page time and even Sienna’s mother was portrayed as having sympathetic qualities.
All in all, this was a well-written YA fantasy I would shove in the faces of anyone who likes dragon literature. I enjoyed it greatly, it has been a delight to read, and I am anxiously anticipating the next installment in the series!
Merged review:
In case the five or so glowy reviews before this had escaped your notice, I am a huge fan of Shreffler’s work. Her other series, The Cat’s Eye Chronicles, has a coveted seat upon my Shelf of Awesome and when I heard she was working on a book with DRAGONS I went a little spastic. This story manages a huge amount of world building, character building, and emotion in a very short space, something that impressed me greatly even with having read her other pieces. It is a fantastic story, even if it did end in a cliffhanger, and I am very much looking forward to watching the series unfold.
The plot: Everything happens pretty quickly here, which was a nice change for me after a steady diet of epics lately. The plot progresses with only enough world building and description that is necessary (huge plus). My only question issue with this story was Sienna’s empathy toward the dragons. It’s explained, but I wanted to see just a little more expansion of the thought and feeling processes she went through before getting to that point. However, that was my one and only—I wouldn’t even call it a complaint. More like a side note.
It is mentioned somewhere that this has romantic elements, but I would say the focus here was definitely more on the dragons. (And if you have a problem with that, go away.) The general feelings of the populace toward dragons were displayed and justified well in the beginning, but I still found myself sympathizing with the dragons more than the people (which was probably Shreffler’s scheme).
The characters: This doesn’t happen especially often, but the heroine was my favorite character. In the beginning, Sienna is going through that whole awkward “on the threshold of adulthood but has no focus” stage that I think most of us go through. That won her huge doses of empathy and she was relatable and human to me, unlike a lot of fantasy heroines that have been cropping up.
Darius, the dragon hunter, has that whole aura of mystery and awesome about him and I have lots of questions about his character. What did he do that got him made a dragon hunter? Who was he before? Like I said, lots of questions for sequels!
Mistress Ash is probably the other main character and also the villain. Everything about her creeped me out from the moment she turned up and it became clear pretty quickly that I was right about here. She was an excellent villain to this story, written to make you hate her and as far as I was concerned, she could join the chopping block queue with Cerastes and Volcrian (references to The Cat’s Eye Chronicles).
The other characters, mainly those from Sienna’s home castle, reacted in understandable ways, but…no, I’m not going to be rooting for them any time soon. On the other hand, I thought they were remarkably developed for such a short span of page time and even Sienna’s mother was portrayed as having sympathetic qualities.
All in all, this was a well-written YA fantasy I would shove in the faces of anyone who likes dragon literature. I enjoyed it greatly, it has been a delight to read, and I am anxiously anticipating the next installment in the series!...more
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