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aenne's review against another edition
3.0
http://www.marilynmuniz.com/2011/05/the-dragons-path-book-review/
Summary
Follow the lives of Captain Marcus Wester, Sir Geder Palliako, Cithrin Bel Sarcour and Dawson Kalliam as they are taken onto the path of war. Each must weave through traitors, political foes and banks to gain what they want.
Review
Structure of the Book
The Dragon’s Path is a slice of life novel. It combines the lives of four individual who are not connected at first but in the end are. The prose is wonderful throughout the novel and reflects each character well. The novel starts off slow and takes a few chapters to settle into a good pace. Once it does, each event provides hints to the future. By the end, the players are in position for the next novel.
Characters
The four main characters are each unique and give us different views of the world around them. Marcus was a hero who killed a king and is feared by many. Because of the death of his wife and daughter, he has stayed away from many conflicts. Cithren would have been Marcus’ daughter age if she survived and he can’t help but to keep her out of trouble due to his guilt.
Cithren’s parents died early in her life and she can’t remember their faces. She became the ward of the bank in Vanai and learned how to run a bank. But as much knowledge as she knows her lack of experiences sets her back.
Geder grows the most during the novel and it isn’t for the better. The core of his personality does not change and he will bring something far worse back home. His ups and downs have made me a fan and I’m hoping the best for him.
Dawson is a selfish man who only thinks of himself. His attitude of the people below him is quite ugly. He does care deeply for his family, but he also cares for the empire and traditions.
Final Thoughts
The slow pace at the beginning caused me to put off reading the book for days. Once I realized the novel was a slice of life, I enjoyed it very much. I wished it touched more on the religious aspect since it will play a big part in the future. If you don’t mind the slowness and the slice of life, then this novel is a must read for you. Personally, I cannot wait to read the next novel.
Summary
Follow the lives of Captain Marcus Wester, Sir Geder Palliako, Cithrin Bel Sarcour and Dawson Kalliam as they are taken onto the path of war. Each must weave through traitors, political foes and banks to gain what they want.
Review
Structure of the Book
The Dragon’s Path is a slice of life novel. It combines the lives of four individual who are not connected at first but in the end are. The prose is wonderful throughout the novel and reflects each character well. The novel starts off slow and takes a few chapters to settle into a good pace. Once it does, each event provides hints to the future. By the end, the players are in position for the next novel.
Characters
The four main characters are each unique and give us different views of the world around them. Marcus was a hero who killed a king and is feared by many. Because of the death of his wife and daughter, he has stayed away from many conflicts. Cithren would have been Marcus’ daughter age if she survived and he can’t help but to keep her out of trouble due to his guilt.
Cithren’s parents died early in her life and she can’t remember their faces. She became the ward of the bank in Vanai and learned how to run a bank. But as much knowledge as she knows her lack of experiences sets her back.
Geder grows the most during the novel and it isn’t for the better. The core of his personality does not change and he will bring something far worse back home. His ups and downs have made me a fan and I’m hoping the best for him.
Dawson is a selfish man who only thinks of himself. His attitude of the people below him is quite ugly. He does care deeply for his family, but he also cares for the empire and traditions.
Final Thoughts
The slow pace at the beginning caused me to put off reading the book for days. Once I realized the novel was a slice of life, I enjoyed it very much. I wished it touched more on the religious aspect since it will play a big part in the future. If you don’t mind the slowness and the slice of life, then this novel is a must read for you. Personally, I cannot wait to read the next novel.
dochappenin's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
calbowen's review against another edition
1.0
This is the final book that I will suffer through - I am now enforcing a 25% rule - if I do not like the book by the 25% mark, then it will remain unfinished - if I won't sit through a bad movie or TV show, why should I with a book ...
the World building is nice and the characters are not flat but this is my problem with this book - this came off as a fantasy Drama - no action (not really) I mean one battle during a 'war' that is never heard about again - one confrontation with bandits that ran away scared from a character that has a reputation for being a bad A but never 'showing' us that he is - oh, you may as well have named him Keyser Soze for all the good that it did - I did not like the character's development and I did not care who lived, died, progressed, won or lost
This is set in a fantasy world with fantasy races and deals with ... Banks and Politics ... seriously - that is it - i got to the end of the book and felt like i read the history of characters and the world setting up for the real novel - which I will not read -
There is a pattern in Fantasy Series in my honest and humble opinion - there are the books of a series where each book is able to stand on its own, and the plot has a beginning, middle, and end, and has a world and characters that you want to read about, so you will head on over to the next book because you WANT to ... then there are those that make a really long so they break it up into multiple books, and find a ‘good pace’ to break them apart -
A Fantasy novel is around 120K words - not part one is 120K words - the entire novel - don’t ‘make’ me invest in your long story because you didn’t want to make a complete and concise story fight within the bindings - a series should be more like a serial (the words are similar from the Latin form) - make a good world, story, and characters, and have the public (you know, the people that you are trying to sell your work to and make THEM happy) make them WANT to read another, and if you have another in you great - if not, then you should stop at the one and move on to your next project - where have all of the good series gone?
the World building is nice and the characters are not flat but this is my problem with this book - this came off as a fantasy Drama - no action (not really) I mean one battle during a 'war' that is never heard about again - one confrontation with bandits that ran away scared from a character that has a reputation for being a bad A but never 'showing' us that he is - oh, you may as well have named him Keyser Soze for all the good that it did - I did not like the character's development and I did not care who lived, died, progressed, won or lost
This is set in a fantasy world with fantasy races and deals with ... Banks and Politics ... seriously - that is it - i got to the end of the book and felt like i read the history of characters and the world setting up for the real novel - which I will not read -
There is a pattern in Fantasy Series in my honest and humble opinion - there are the books of a series where each book is able to stand on its own, and the plot has a beginning, middle, and end, and has a world and characters that you want to read about, so you will head on over to the next book because you WANT to ... then there are those that make a really long so they break it up into multiple books, and find a ‘good pace’ to break them apart -
A Fantasy novel is around 120K words - not part one is 120K words - the entire novel - don’t ‘make’ me invest in your long story because you didn’t want to make a complete and concise story fight within the bindings - a series should be more like a serial (the words are similar from the Latin form) - make a good world, story, and characters, and have the public (you know, the people that you are trying to sell your work to and make THEM happy) make them WANT to read another, and if you have another in you great - if not, then you should stop at the one and move on to your next project - where have all of the good series gone?
tregina's review against another edition
4.0
In my head, this will forever be known as the book that made me excited about banking. Banking. Of course it's a hundred other things too, all of them well balanced and intriguing, and has one of the best uses of multiple POV characters I've seen in a long time—not just taking us from place to place and storyline to storyline, but raising questions of who is on the right side and who is on the wrong side and what everyone's agenda really is.
veraann's review against another edition
4.0
Dagger and Coin Book #1
Good start to a fantasy series. Politics, war, magic dragons. It is written in different character PoV for each chapter. Everything connects and come together nicely. It does start out a bit slow when getting to know the different characters and what is going on in the world through their eyes. There is not too much action here, but a couple intense moments and interesting parts.
I will definitely continue to see where this story goes.
Good start to a fantasy series. Politics, war, magic dragons. It is written in different character PoV for each chapter. Everything connects and come together nicely. It does start out a bit slow when getting to know the different characters and what is going on in the world through their eyes. There is not too much action here, but a couple intense moments and interesting parts.
I will definitely continue to see where this story goes.
sweetmeggles's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
5.0
jkreuzer14's review against another edition
4.0
Despite some grammatical errors, the characters were intriguing and the ending left me excited for the next book in the series.
immense_storm's review against another edition
adventurous
hopeful
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
storytimed's review against another edition
4.5
Since he's unemployed he devours about a book a day and reads them before I even crack the spine. I remember distinctly him reading this book in the living room, looking up briefly, and saying: "Bro. War crimes."
Which, uh, is not a bad description for what happens in this book!
I also read this whole series in about a week and a half, though I wanted to know what happened more than I really enjoyed the moment-to-moment experience of reading. The pace is slow and the prose is a little long-winded, but the plot is v. v. gripping
In this introductory book, we get our main characters:
Cithrin, an orphan raised by the bank (the Coin in Dagger and Coin), who spends much of the book depressed and trying to hide her identity, until she gets a magic pep talk that gives her the confidence to start a FAKE BANK
Marcus, a big blah of nothing mercenary captain whose wife and daughter died blah blah who cares. More interesting are his second-in-command Yardem, a Tralgu (orc with long ears, basically) ex-priest who has funny banter with him, and the band of actors he's hired to pretend to be his crew of guards on a simple caravan-guarding contract
Dawson Kalliam, a noble snob from the army that just invaded Cithrin's city trying to intruige against fellow aristocrats
And probably the most interesting (and my brother's favorite), Geder Palliako, Mr. War Crime himself
We're introduced to Geder as the sweet, bullied scholar who is part of the invading army and doesn't want to be. When he gets command of the city, genre expectations are that he uses his studies to do unexpectedly well, take care of the citizens, etc.
Instead... He fails spectacularly and BURNS DOWN THE CITY because he read something like that in a book once
Oops I had to head to company potluck but basically: he commits the war crime and then for political reasons (Dawson is invested in making it look like Geder did good) Geder is massively celebrated for being Man Enough to Do War Crimes
And then he starts continuously failing upwards without understanding anything! Yay!
It's super interesting because your usual fantasy villain is either sadistic or a sad woobie with a tragic backstory. Geder is neither. He's a normal kid, a shy Sam Tarly type, who ends up doing terrible things because of his insecurity and capacity for self-delusion
Super interesting start to the series and I enjoyed it a lot