Book Reviews

Book Blurb

The greatest thief captures an unexpected prize.

Madfall is the greatest thief in the kingdom, stealing crowns off the very heads of kings. His hoard is legendary. Simply put, he’s a dragon through and through. So, when he steals a basket of “gold” from the king’s castle but finds a baby inside, he’s at a loss. What’s a dragon to do?

Seventeen years later, inexperienced knight Richard of Benfro sets out to slay the dragon, expecting death or glory. Not the most awkward meet-cute in history when he’s captured by the dragon’s human—and handsome—son.

Oenyn has been content living with Madfall, enjoying the fierce and protective love of his adopted father. But he’s always been curious about humanity. When Richard blunders into the home he shares with Madfall, Oenyn grabs the chance to learn all he can about people, castle life, sex . . . and maybe love. At least until Richard makes a startling discovery.

Caught between a potential future in the human world and his old life, Oenyn is faced with an impossible choice. Luckily, being raised by a dragon has left him plenty stubborn. He won’t give up his father, or his human family, without a fight.

 

 

First edition published by Less Than Three Press, February 2018.

 

Book Review

Dragons! I am happy to say that the basic idea behind ‘Heart of the Dragon’ is very different from some other dragon-themed books I have read. It is set in a sort-of-medieval fictional world, but this time, the dragon is not a shifter. Instead, Madfall is an intelligent, sentient being with an agenda of amassing treasure while terrifying as many humans as possible to keep up his badass reputation. But then an unfortunate accident has him end up with a human baby boy (instead of the gold he expected to find in the stolen basket), and Madfall’s life changes in unforeseen ways. The story is sweet, funny, and I loved watching Madfall go from a grumpy, solitary dragon to a loving father – even if he’d never admit that change in a million years.

Madfall is a master thief, and he has spent months staking out the castle to find a way to get his claws on one of the baskets used to smuggle gold outside the castle walls. But when the day comes for him to get the basket, he makes an unfortunate error – or Fate intervenes -  and what he finds inside once he is back in his cave is a baby. He decides to return the baby for a gold ransom, but it isn’t as easy as he thought to let go of the little guy…. Madfall’s reaction is less than enthusiastic once he figures out the extent of his dilemma: “Madfall frowned. He had a stinky human and a terrified sheep in his home, and he wasn't supposed to eat either of them. His luck seemed to have decidedly run out.” As the story progresses, there are subtle changes in Madfall’s thinking that made me like him more with every page.

Oenyn has been raised to develop dragon instincts, but he knows that he is not a dragon. He ends up with an interesting balance between the dragon values Madfall teaches him and the human ideas he obtains from reading the books Madfall steals for him. His way of looking at things often baffles Madfall, and I loved all those little examples of their differences over the years as much as I enjoyed seeing where they both agree. The scene where Oenyn, age twelve, convinces Madfall that stealing is wrong and that he will have to start buying stuff Oenyn needs – using his treasure! Gasp! – is simply hilarious as well as very emotional.

Richard is eighteen, the third son of a minor lord, and desperately needs to prove himself to his knight commander so he will be taken seriously. The only way to do that is volunteer for a quest – that of killing the dragon who has haunted the kingdom for hundreds of years. As Richard approaches the cave where, according to scholars, the dragon lives he realizes he is ill-prepared but he is determined to slay the dragon so people will take him seriously and his father can stop worrying about money. When Richard finds a young man his own age in the cave his shock is palpable, and the scene that follows is priceless. Oenyn and Richard are both stubborn and watching their battle of words had me laughing out loud.

There are quite a few elements of the Jungle Book (by Rudyard Kipling) in this story: the human boy raised by what some would call a fearsome creature, the boy’s struggle to fit into the dragon world he knows and the human world he understands he is part of, and, in result if not in detail, the ending. But this story is so much richer: I got to see the dragon’s point of view, Oenyn is very good at articulating the conflict between his allegiance for his loving dragon father and the attraction of a human life, and Richard added a wonderful new dimension by becoming Oenyn’s link to his human heritage. Absolutely wonderful!

If you like stories about dragons who are as much characters as the humans they interact with, if you enjoy adventurous romances where two men with very different outlooks on life need to figure out how to deal with their differences, and if you’re looking for a highly entertaining read with a lot of heart, then you will probably like this novella as much as I do. It’s an imaginative look at the meaning of parenthood, the difficulties that cultural differences can cause in relationships, and a heartwarming story I will remember for quite a while.

 

 

 

 

DISCLAIMER: Books reviewed on this site were usually provided at no cost by the publisher or author. This book has been provided by the publisher for the purpose of a review.

Additional Information

Format	ebook
Length	Novel, 193 pages/51000 words
Heat Level
Publication Date	15-June-2020
Price	$3.99 ebook
Buy Link	https://riptidepublishing.com/collections/new-releases/products/heart-of-the-dragon