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marissas_library 's review for:
His Majesty's Dragon
by Naomi Novik
3.5
As someone who cares very little about both dragons and historical fiction, the first book in the Temeraire series about a captain and his dragon during the Napoleonic wars was a pleasant surprise.
Novik decided to make her dragons talk — which could have become very cheesy very fast — but it works here. Obviously the dragons and their training/fights were the most interesting part of the book, but it was paced well enough that the filler chapters weren’t too dull.
Speaking of dull, it’s a shame that this series follows Laurence when we could have followed the battle-hardened badass Jane Roland or rookie aviator Catherine Harcourt. Certain dragon breeds will only bond with a female captain and the presence of female aviators is kept a secret to those outside the service, which is a scenario just begging for a cool female lead! Laurence is meant to be a bit of a stick in the mud, which is fine, but he remained the same person throughout the book and his only personality traits were being obsessed with his dragon and being a bit of a hard ass.
I liked that we saw how intertwined the lives of the aviators and their dragons were and the mutual respect between them. I just wish Laurence and Temeraire had gone through some conflict that progressed their relationship, or that we saw some character growth from literally anyone, because there was not much here.
Luckily this is Naomi Novik so any criticisms I had were calmed by her amazing writing, and I’d be willing to see how this series progresses with book two.
As someone who cares very little about both dragons and historical fiction, the first book in the Temeraire series about a captain and his dragon during the Napoleonic wars was a pleasant surprise.
Novik decided to make her dragons talk — which could have become very cheesy very fast — but it works here. Obviously the dragons and their training/fights were the most interesting part of the book, but it was paced well enough that the filler chapters weren’t too dull.
Speaking of dull, it’s a shame that this series follows Laurence when we could have followed the battle-hardened badass Jane Roland or rookie aviator Catherine Harcourt. Certain dragon breeds will only bond with a female captain and the presence of female aviators is kept a secret to those outside the service, which is a scenario just begging for a cool female lead! Laurence is meant to be a bit of a stick in the mud, which is fine, but he remained the same person throughout the book and his only personality traits were being obsessed with his dragon and being a bit of a hard ass.
I liked that we saw how intertwined the lives of the aviators and their dragons were and the mutual respect between them. I just wish Laurence and Temeraire had gone through some conflict that progressed their relationship, or that we saw some character growth from literally anyone, because there was not much here.
Luckily this is Naomi Novik so any criticisms I had were calmed by her amazing writing, and I’d be willing to see how this series progresses with book two.