Monday, August 27, 2018

Book 29: Dragon's Blood by Jane Yolen

This is one of those books which I've had for I don't know how many years and yet had never read. So I finally did, and it was charming!

The book is set on a desert world where dragons are raised and trained to be fighters in pits for entertainment, essentially like gladiators. The protagonist is a boy named Jakkin, whose father had been killed by a feral dragon he had been attempting to train. As a result, he had become a bond boy who had to work off his debt by cleaning and raising dragons on essentially a dragon ranch. But he had a plan to clear that debt by stealing a dragon egg or hatchling and raising it on his own to be a fighter.

It's the first of a trilogy, and you can definitely feel that in terms of how far the story gets, and the way it's setting up the larger arc of the series. But I definitely became invested in Jakkin and his dragon, and the secrets that he keeps while training his dragon and the secrets that others have which he's largely unaware of. There are times when Jakkin is a bit slow on the uptake, but in a way that's largely charming rather than frustrating. I am definitely looking forward to reading the next two books in the trilogy.

Grade: B

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