The Problem with Dragons

I realize at this point I haven’t recommended any books with actual dragons in them yet.

The last two books I read with dragons were The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien and Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros. I’m honestly not sure that I would really want to recommend either of them.

The Hobbit

The Hobbit is a good book for middle schoolers, but I guess I expected so much more from it because all my life I have heard what a master storyteller J.R.R. Tolkien is, and this story didn’t feel masterful to me.

I expected it to read at a YA level, but I was dumbfounded by the complete lack of female characters. It seemed odd that Gandalf would be helping the dwarves who come off as little more than talking, hat-wearing baboons. When the battle finally arrives, Bilbo, the main character, is knocked out instantly and misses the whole thing. We are treated to a short summation after Bilbo regains consciousness once the battle is finished. As a writer, this trope of knocking out your character at the beginning of all the action and summarizing it briefly later feels like cheating and, quite frankly, a bit lazy.

Now that I have insulted the memory of the man who is considered the greatest fantasy writer of all time, let’s talk about what he got right.

Another highlight for me was Bilbo meeting Smeagol/Gollum and their riddles and repartee.

It’s not hard to see why teenage boys would enjoy this book; it has all sorts of fantastical creatures, from giant spiders to goblins and elves, and of course, a dragon.

Fourth Wing

The other dragon book I read recently is Fourth Wing, and honestly, I simultaneously hate and love this book.

I love that I felt propelled through this book. I didn’t want to set it down. The author kept me hooked. I wanted to know the truth; I wanted to know what was going to happen to Xaden and Violet. It has been a long time since I got sucked into a book this way, and it’s one of the things I want in a book. I want to hunger for the rest of the story. The last book that captured me this way was Twilight by Stephenie Meyer, and despite loopholes in the plot, it was exceedingly well-written.

Fourth Wing fails to meet the exceedingly well-written bar set by Stephenie Meyer. Rebecca Yarros created a wonderful dark, moody world. The magic in her story is well-defined and not like any other book I have read so far. She did a tantalizing job of building tension between Xaden, Violet, and Dane. Each dragon had its own distinct personality, which is great character voice.

What I hated was the unnecessary information dump at the beginning of the book. The same information is relayed later in more effective ways. The information dump didn’t progress the plot, and as someone who is aspiring to be a published author, the guidance is always that information dumps and scenes that don’t progress the plot are big no-nos. So this is a bit of a pet peeve for me.

The other thing I found super annoying was Violet’s dialogue. For a character who spent almost all of her life surrounded by scribes, she swears like a sailor. Violet is characterized as clever and highly intelligent and is therefore expected to join the scribe quadrant, but instead, at her mother’s insistence, joins the dragon rider’s quadrant.

At one point, she uses the phrase “Bat S**t Crazy,” and that modern language really breaks the illusion for me. Even if the book “is a translation” of an older story, you still would never translate a modern phrase like that. The constant use of expletives is lazy dialogue and a missed opportunity for character growth.

If Violet had begun the story talking intelligently like a scribe-in-training and slowly progressed to being a complete potty mouth after spending months and months training in the much rougher rider’s quadrant, that would make for better character development. Every time Violet swore, it felt out of character and pulled me back out of the story, which, as you can imagine, was irritating.

Lastly, this book at times feels completely driven by lust and that’s the biggest reason that I don’t feel like I can confidently recommend this book.

You Decide

Now you have the good and the bad of both books. Read at your discretion.

I would love recommendations for good dragon books to add to my To Be Read list. Please comment below with your thoughts and suggestions.