Reviews

A Natural History of Dragons by Marie Brennan

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literary_ash's review against another edition

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adventurous funny fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

timinbc's review against another edition

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3.0

Hmm. So Flavia de Luce grows up to her late teens, then is whisked off to a Victorian-era version of our world only with dragons. Then she does what you'd expect her to do, and again as you expect, she is the one whose recklessness uncovers the clues, AND she is the only one smart enough to put it all together.

Sadly, when you put such a woman so centrally, you are forced to write a bland "yes, dear" husband who's just so nice and decent that you know it can't end well.

And you are forced to have all the older and more powerful characters blown aside 127 times in a row by the force of her conviction (hello, Flavia). Coupled with knowing she got out of it OK, we have limited dramatic tension. And the plot advances just a bit slowly.

If you're a dragon lover hoping for another dose of McCaffrey, go elsewhere. In this one at least, they are just dim neighbourhood predators. I'm going to assume this will change in later volumes.

It will be useful if this is not your first story with a female protagonist in the Victorian era. Brennan moves fairly quickly past the standard "but a mere woman .." and "stand back and let a man handle this" stuff. It's unavoidable in the era. There might be something to be said for setting such stories in another era, but we can't have them using smartphones etc. so maybe not.

But if you approach this as a light read - which I needed after tackling Greg Egan's Dichronauts - this is just fine. I will read the next one if I come across it, but I won't move heaven and earth to find it.