This time, the story kicks off right where the last novel ended, with Temeraire, the mercenary ferals and the remains of the Prussian army in sights of the English coast after their escape from the occupying French forces. However, there are no dragons to be seen, adding to the questions that have been building since the previous novel. It’s always hard to tell with series how much novelists plan ahead and know exactly where the broad strokes are going vs how much is figured out […]
Of course, even the dragons are orderly in Prussia
After the previous novel’s odd pacing, Black Powder War was a refreshing change. While this one also involves a long journey since Temeraire, Laurence and his crew must return from China, it is a much more interesting (and dragon filled) journey. After a fire leaves the dragon transport needing repairs, the ship pulls into port at Macau where Laurence receives a message telling him to go to Istanbul to pick up three eggs with no moment to spare. Based on this, Temeraire’s crew decides to […]
Heritage Tourism for Dragons
In the last part of His Majesty’s Dragon, Temeraire and Laurence realize that Temeraire is a not only a Chinese dragon as they already knew but a Celestial, a breed reserved for the Imperial family. After Temeraire discovers his special power, divine wind, in a battle with the French, the rest of the world knows it, too, and the second novel begins after the Chinese delegation’s arrival to determine what is to be done about Laurence and Temeraire. The group even includes the emperor’s brother, […]
Here There Be Dragons
Last December, I ended up checking out Uprooted by Naomi Novik which had an adult fairy tale vibe (I think TyburnBlossom shared a link to it on Facebook?). Curious to see what else she had written, I was surprised to see she had a nine book series about dragons during the Napoleonic Wars. Alternate historical fiction fantasy definitely was not what I was expecting to find in her back catalog, but when I needed a break from the large non fiction tomb I am reading […]
When Speculative Fiction Speculates All Too Well
Like many of the books I read, I first heard about Underground Airlines on NPR—in a book review by Maureen Corrigan on Fresh Air. It came out about the same time as Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead. Because I read Whitehead’s novel first, that world was rattling through my head as I entered the alternative history that Ben Winter has created—where the civil war never happened and where slavery still exists in the United States, even if it’s only confined to four southern states. It’s […]
Wolves at the Door
There are actually 12 books in the Wolves Chronicles, but when I was a kid I only read six of them, and these were the six that I recently reread and am reviewing: The Wolves of Willoughby Chase, Black Hearts in Battersea, Nightbirds on Nantucket, The Stolen Lake, The Cuckoo Tree, and Dido and Pa. The series takes place in alternate timeline in 1800s England (in this timeline, James II was never deposed in the Glorious Revolution, and so throughout the books his descendants sit […]