The Dragon Book

Mini-Review

I have just finished reading The Dragon Book: Magical Tales from the Masters of Modern Fantasy edited by Jack Dann and Gardner Dozois. I thouroghly enjoyed it; not a single story failed to entertain!

As a fan of Naomi Novik's Temeraire series, I'll admit that the main reason I purchased this book was for her story, Vici. I was not dissapointed.

I was, however, pleasantly suprised that the other stories in the book also held my interest. There is some great variation represented by this collection in both setting and type of type of dragon(s) encountered. For instance, one story may take you to Tsarist Russia where winged terrors are hatched from firery eggs while another takes you to a 195o's nuclear testing site in Nevada where an ancient alien dragon curse comes to light.

While each story has it's own weaknesses, and some stories are weaker than others, the collection as a whole was excellent.

My favorite stories were:

• Humane Killer by Diana Gabaldon and Samuel Sykes
• A Stark and Wormy Knight by Tad Williams
• None So Blind by Harry Turtledove
• The War That Winter Is by Tanith Lee
• The Dragon's Tale by Tamora Pierce
• Dragon Storm by Mary Rosenblum

Oh, and don't let John Jude Palencar's destinctive cover image fool you - the book does not contain a story by Christopher Paolini.

****/5