League of Dragons, by Naomi Novik

Today I'm finally finishing with the Temeraire series with the ninth book, League of Dragons. As I mentioned in my review of the previous book, Blood of Serpents, I had started having concerns about this series because I knew we were close to the end and it seemed like there wasn't quite enough space to finish the series. I hate to say it but I feel like this kind of happened with this book as well. It seemed like Novik had a lot of really neat ideas that could have been developed further but there just wasn't enough time in the series to talk about those ideas. I'm left wondering if maybe Novik had gotten tired with the series and was just looking to end it with everything (mostly) wrapped up. The result is a book that feels alternately fast paced and meandering and with me wishing for more.

The book begins where we left off, with Laurence and Temeraire in Russsia after Napoleon's disastrous 1812 campaign. But after we spend some time in Russia, Temeraire and Laurence discover that Temeraire and Iskierka's egg is in danger of being stolen by French agents with the aim of binding the dragon within to Napoleon's son and jeopardizing the already tenuous alliance between Britain and China. Temeraire rushes off towards China, only to get halfway across Russia and be told that the French have already stolen the egg and he now has to rush back towards Europe to try and catch them in the Alps.

Temeraire and Iskierka rush towards France to get their egg back, only to be captured by the French. They then have to plot how to escape with Laurence, and Granby, and the egg. After spending a good chunk of time captured and plotting their escape, they then flee back to England and get involved in planning the counter-attack against Napoleon in the 1813 campaign. As the Peninsular campaign pushes towards the Pyrenees, Laurence finally is awarded the rank of Admiral and is sent with a British detachment of dragons to fight with the Coalition forces including Prussians and Russians and eventually the Chinese as well. Towards the end of the book the Coalition manages not only to crush Napoleon's army, but capture Napoleon himself. Napoleon is allowed to abdicate in favor of his son, and goes into exile on St. Helena.

This is kind of what I mean by the book being alternately fast-paced and meandering. When we're spending time with our main characters being kept prisoner or sitting in camp waiting for Napoleon's forces to come into Prussia, we seem to spend a lot of time sitting around talking about the rights that dragons are interested in getting, and dealing with issues like feeding hundreds of dragons. But then really important things happen (sometimes off-screen) really quickly and we spend some time afterwards catching up on events.

One of the most interesting things about this book was the idea of a concord, initially proposed by Napoleon. The concord is a collection of ideas and rights for dragons, putting them on an equal footing with humans. This initially gets quite a large amount of support from feral dragons, which prompts Temeraire and other English dragons to start working on their own concord. This eventually gets introduced as the Dragon Rights Act by Perscitia, who's the first dragon member of Parliament. This actually was a development I thought was interesting and would have been interested in seeing more of, especially after it's passed and Temeraire starts thinking about pursuing a career in politics. That's just something I would have liked to see more of and might have been more interesting than sitting around dealing with supply problems while on campaign in Germany.

Ultimately I'm a little disappointed with the results of the series. There was a lot of potential in this series and there were a lot of interesting ideas, but I'm left wishing for a little bit more in the end. I think this series has some good parts and there are some enjoyable parts, especially the characters. But I feel like there could have been some more development, especially towards the end of the series. They're enjoyable reads, but as I've said before this series is mostly literary candy.

- Kalpar 

Blood of Tyrants, by Naomi Novik

Today I'm looking at the eighth and penultimate book of the Temeraire series, Blood of Tyrants, and this is actually a point where I was outright disappointed in the series. As I've said time and time again the thing I've noticed about this series is that most of the books are similar to the others and most of the time it involves Laurence and Temeraire being tourists in various locations throughout the world. I think it's interesting to see how different cultures treat dragons in this world where humans and dragons coexist, but there was a lot of the series that felt like literary candy similar to the Sharpe series. So I've been giving the series middling reviews because while I liked them and there was a lot that was pretty good, there wasn't anything spectacular to write home about either.

The biggest issue I had with this book was the decision to start the book with Laurence having amnesia, which seems to serve no purpose but create filler. When we last left our characters, the Potentate, Laurence, Temeraire, and the rest of their dragon wing set sail from Brazil to China for an official visit with the Imperial family, Laurence's adopted family, for a potential alliance between China and Great Britain. Along the way the Potentate runs into a storm and ends up washed on rocks off the coast of Japan. Along the way Laurence is washed overboard and wakes up in Japan with amnesia, having completely forgotten the past eight years of his life, incidentally completely wiping out any memory of Temeraire or his service in the aerial corps.

Personally I disliked the amnesia plot because I felt it didn't really serve any purpose in the story. I think it would have been fine to have Laurence wash up on Japan and get the taste of Japanese dragons versus Chinese dragons (although based on what little we got I don't know how different Japan was) before heading onward to China. Instead we have Japanese officials wondering what exactly to do with Laurence especially because he says he has amnesia and the Japanese don't believe him anyway. Really the only thing that the amnesia does is create drama for later on between Laurence, Temeraire, and the other aviators. First there's the drama of Temeraire feeling guilty that Laurence has missed out on all the things he could have experienced with a naval career instead. And then there's the awkwardness around talking about Laurence's past, specifically when he gave the cure to the dragon plague to the French and as a result was convicted of treason. And it felt so tiresome to tread over this ground over and over again.

This is the point where the amnesia plot starts to feel like so much filler because we're going over the same psychological problems that Laurence and Temeraire have gone over before and we resolved them. Now since I have psychological problems myself I understand that deep-seated issues aren't solved overnight, or even solved once and for all. But with fiction it gets frustrating that the characters keep going over the same issues that were resolved in previous books And it feels like Laurence gets amnesia just so we could go over the same ground again, but regardless of whether he'd had amnesia or not, Temeraire felt responsible for losing Laurence's fortune and the need to make it up to Laurence somehow. So there still would have been an issue whether Laurence had amnesia or not.

I say this feels like filler because this book finally returns to the war with Napoleon by having Laurence and Temeraire lead three hundred Chinese dragons to the Russian front to help the Russians drive back Napoleon. Students of history will of course recognize this is Napoleon's 1812 Russia campaign, widely regarded as the major reason for his empire falling. When we leave our main characters the outcome of the Russian campaign is in doubt, the Russians and Chinese have been driven back, their lines of supply destroyed, and despite all their efforts Napoleon appears to once again have the upper hand. With winter setting in, the situation looks desperately grim for the coalition powers. But for me it didn't feel like a natural stopping point in the narrative and now I'm worried that the end to the Russian campaign in the last book is going to be rushed so Novik can put other things in. Maybe I'll be wrong but we'll have to find out.

Honestly, the amnesia plot is my biggest complaint because it doesn't seem to serve a purpose beyond filler. Especially when we've gotten this deep into the series and are on the cusp of wrapping everything up once and for all. The rest of the book feels a lot like the rest of the series so it's fair to middling, I just think Novik could have used time more profitably.

- Kalpar

Crucible of Gold, by Naomi Novik

Today I'm finally getting back to the Temeraire series with Crucible of Gold, which took me a while to get from the library because of a waiting list. As I've said before with this series the books kind of feel the same, sort of like with the Sharpe series. However, that doesn't mean that the series isn't enjoyable to me. It's kind of like literary candy, not necessarily substantive but a fun time to enjoy and this book continues much in that same vein.

When we left off with Temeraire and Laurence they were settling on the edges of Botany Bay colony trying to make a life for themselves. This of course is upset at the start of the book when Arthur Hammond, ambassador plenipotentiary for the British Empire, arrives from China to announce that the war has taken a turn for the worse and Britain needs Laurence and Temeraire to help their Portugese allies in Brazil who have been invaded by the Tswana of Africa, determined to liberate and repatriate all the slaves. Once more on the Allegiance Temeraire, Iskierka, and Kulingile must fight for king and country.

There actually was a point I liked about this book and it was when we got to see the Inca Empire in South America with its own unique dragons and their own system of government. If there's one thing I like it's Novik's different approaches to how cultures treat their dragons and it seems that the number of people compared to dragons is a huge influence on this. In Europe there are a large number of people and relatively few dragons, so dragons are kept separated from people and are at the start of the series basically pets or property. In China, the number of dragons is much greater and so dragons have a roughly equal status with humans. And with the Tswana in Africa, dragons are believed to be the reincarnations of revered ancestors and occupy leadership and advisory roles for their descendants.

The Incan Empire is a far different example. The majority of the Incan population, much like in regular history, has been wiped out by smallpox and other diseases. This has resulted in significant changes to Incan society and now the humans are practically the pets or arguably property of the dragons. Much like historical Andean cultures, the Incans are organized into ayllu, which function as both a local government and as an extended family group. Previously ayllus would compete for the honor of having a dragon as a member, but after so much of the Incan population has been wiped out the dragons took responsibility for taking care of and protecting the allyus. It has gotten to the point where the dragons guard the members of their allyu jealously and if humans are found alone a dragon will capture the human for their own allyu. It's an interesting inversion where the dragons appear to rule and the humans serve, in distinct contrast to the other books.

The thing that bothers me, though, is that I wish Novik had spent more time talking about the culture of the Incan Empire and seeing more of how their society works. I kind of got an impression based on the information but so much of the book is focused on other stuff that it feels kind of shortchanged. Part of the book focuses on their leaving Australia and then their various misadventures in the Pacific Ocean. After experiencing a five-day storm, a fire breaks out on the Allegiance and hits the powder magazine, bursting the ship to splinters. The dragons and survivors get picked up by a French ship and get marooned on a remote island in the Pacific. Because they manage to find a wrecked ship on the island our main characters are able to reach the Incans on their own and that whole part of the plot feels like a massive distraction. It makes me really wish Novik had spent more time on the more interesting parts of the series instead of the stranded on an island drama.

I'm hoping the last two books will go well and hopefully provide a nice conclusion. But as I said, this series feels a lot more like literary candy to me.

- Kalpar

Tongues of Serpents, by Naomi Novik

Today I'm looking at the sixth book in the Temeraire series, Tongues of Serpents. I'll say from the start that this book seem to mostly be more of the same in the previous five books, but with a change in setting. In this case our characters are in distant Australia, after Laurence's sentence for treason against the United Kingdom was commuted from execution to life transportation to Botany Bay. Laurence hopes to spend at least some time living with Temeraire in obscurity, but a rebellion in Australia deposed the local governor, the infamous Captain Bligh (events which actually happened, by the way, so that's neat). Laurence is once again placed into an awkward situation because of Temeraire. Bligh is eager to offer Laurence a pardon in exchange for his help to reestablish Bligh as governor. The leaders of the rebellion, by contrast, are willing to offer Laurence material benefits such as land and influence within the colony for his help to secure their control of the colony.

Faced with an unpalatable choice, Laurence takes a third option offered by one of the rebel leaders. Laurence, Temeraire, and the rest of the dragons will take a band of convicts to build a cattle road into the mountains surrounding Sydney and help expand the colony into Australia's interior. Tharkay has also been charged with the East India Company with discovering the source of the many smuggled Chinese goods found in Sydney, and he believes that the smugglers are sending the goods overland. Discovery of porcelain in the Australian interior confirms this hypothesis, and soon Laurence, Temeraire, and company are racing across the Outback.

In some ways this feels a lot like parts of Blackpowder War because of the vast sections of travelling, but instead of following the Silk Road from China to Istanbul, our characters are crossing all of Australia from south to north. The result can be a little tedious because they're basically flying through an enormous desert, although some of the challenges they encounter are interesting. But I think the parts towards the beginning and and end of the book are the most worthwhile.

This isn't to say that there aren't redeeming parts to this book. I think my favorite thing out of this book was the dragon Kulingile. When he first hatches he's so malformed that most of the experienced aeronauts don't expect Kulingile to live and want to mercy-kill him. However Demane, one of the African boys who joined Laurence's entourage, adopts Kulingile and much to everyone's surprise it turns out that Kulingile will not only live, but will grow to be larger than even a Regal Copper, probably reaching some twenty-four tons. Despite all this, Kulingile is such a kind character that I ended up cheering for him, especially when he ends up becoming a balloon dragon. So I'm looking forward to more of him in the last few books.

I also liked the development of the trade network between native Australians, Pacific Islanders, and the Chinese which use dragons as a means of transportation. Granted I'm a sucker for stories about transportation so seeing a trade network develop is fun for me, but maybe not as much fun for other people.

Overall I thought this book was fine, if mostly more of the same. But I'm finding I say that about a lot of this series. I don't know if there's anything specific in any of the books that stand out and make it seem like a fantastic series to me, but it's still a good series. Novik is an incredibly competent writer and her books in the series have always been enjoyable and very easy to read or listen to. They're solid mid-grade fiction worth your time if it piques your interest.

- Kalpar 

Victory of Eagles, by Naomi Novik

Today I've reached the halfway point in the Temeraire series with the fifth book, Victory of Eagles. I will say that my first impression of this book is that it's providing more of the same that we've seen in the previous four books. That being said, I do like what Novik's been doing with this series so I don't mind terribly much that the books feel fairly similar in structure, if not in particulars.

This book picks up some months after the ending of Empire of Ivory, with Laurence convicted a traitor and his sentence of death commuted until such time as the government can be certain Temeraire won't attack Britain. Laurence has been imprisoned in a British ship of the line while Temeraire has been relegated to the breeding grounds. Temeraire has been having a frustrating time because there is very little to do within the breeding grounds other than eat, sleep, and breed, leaving him starved for intellectual stimulation. Temeraire starts introducing the dragons to concepts such as personal property when news comes that Napoleon has landed in Britain.

Laurence the ship he's imprisoned in caught in the first battle of Napoleon's invasion of England and only through great luck and skill manages to survive the sinking of the ship and make it safely back to Dover. Due to the extremity of the situation Laurence is ordered to gather Temeraire and help drive back the French invasion. This is made more complicated when it turns out that Temeraire has just...disappeared, and with a large number of dragons with him.

I think what I liked most about this book was following Temeraire and his scratch company of dragons which achieves official military status when, due to an assumption by military command, Temeraire receives a commission as a colonel. There're also some interesting dragon characters such as Minnow and Perscitia who I came to like just as much as I liked Temeraire and Iskierka who were by far the most developed dragon characters within the series. I also like the developments of integrated human and dragon forces in the military and the innovations that Temeraire and company use to help fight Napoleon.

I don't know how I feel about the ending of this book because despite their efforts, Laurence and Temeraire are transported to Australia. Personally I dislike this because I wanted Laurence and Temeraire to stay and help fight Napoleon, and I wanted to see more land battles with dragons and infantry squares and artillery. Largely because I like the Napoleonic wars. The books have definitely spent far more time travelling outside of Britain exploring locations like China, Turkey, and sub-Saharan Africa. Now that Laurence and Temeraire are banished to Australia it looks like we'll be spending even more time exploring distant lands. I just feel like this series promised Napoleonic Wars with Dragons and I'd have liked to see more of that but I guess it was wrong of me to expect that.

All my issues aside, I did enjoy this book, much like I enjoyed the other four books, and I intend to keep following the series as I can get them from the library.

- Kalpar

Empire of Ivory, by Naomi Novik

Today I'm looking at the fourth book of the Temeraire series, Empire of Ivory. When we left off Captain Laurence and Temeraire were helping to evacuate remnants of the Prussian army from the besieged city of Danzig. When we rejoin our heroes they're making a mad dash for the coast of England pursued by French dragons. Despite firing signal flares it's only a shore battery that manages to keep the French dragons at bay and allow Temeraire, Iskierka, and the feral dragons to land safely in England.

Understandably they're perplexed by this situation and much to their dismay that the dragons of England have been struck down by a mysterious plague. Many of the dragons have been sick for a year or more and Britain faces the very real possibility of losing all its dragons. The strategic considerations are gravely concerning, but it's emotionally terrifying for the aerial corps as well because of the deep emotional attachment between the dragons and their crews. Temeraire, Iskierka, and the feral dragons have to protect the shores of England from invasion. When Temeraire accidentally gets exposed to infected dragons Laurence braces for the worst...until Temeraire fails to get sick. It appears Temeraire already had the illness during their trip to China and something, whether the environment of Cape Town or something he ate, fought the illness. Temeraire and his ill friends are packed back back up onto the Allegiance and dispatched back to Cape Town to find a cure.

The thing I liked most about this book was the result of the expedition to Cape Town and their search for the pungent mushroom which is the cure for the dragons' illness. As it was established previously in other books, expeditions into Africa's interior had disappeared without a trace leaving the interior of the continent a vast unknown. The assumption is that feral dragons are in such large populations that any expedition is simply killed. What our characters discover is that the interior is ruled by an organized empire, very similar to the Zulu nation, with the support of dragons who the Africans revere as reincarnations of their honored ancestors. The Africans have been willing to tolerate European interlopers, despite the ongoing slave trade, but with the arrival of European dragons the Africans assume the Europeans are making a serious bid for settlement. In response the Africans launch successful attacks not only against Cape Town, but all the major slave-trading ports up and down the African coast.

I liked this development in particular because it shows an advanced civilization in Africa, as well as a reference to an Incan empire in the Americas that kept Spanish colonialism at bay and the state of Mysore that has used their dragons to keep Britain at bay in India. With the Chinese culture which we saw in Throne of Jade, we see how multiple cultures, with the aid of dragons, have managed to curtail European encroachment, something that took off in the nineteenth century but the seeds of which were sewn in the eighteenth and seventeenth centuries. Granted, these are oversimplified versions of various global cultures, but it's not necessarily something I expected from a fantasy series. (Incidentally I also find it somewhat ironic that the deadly dragon-killing disease came from North America and infected European dragons in an inversion of the historical smallpox epidemic which killed upwards of 90% of the Native American population.)

Another theme that's been growing ever since at least the second book is Laurence and other people seeing dragons as people with rational minds, rather than highly intelligent animals. European cultures, at least, think of dragons as highly sophisticated animals that need to be tamed but you can't expect to reason with them. This is in decided contrast with China where dragons are practically equal members of society, and in Africa where dragons are leaders and advisers. As the series goes on the Europeans are going to be increasingly faced with the fact their dragons are just as intelligent, or perhaps more so, than their human companions.

Overall this was a good installment in the series and I look forward to more.

- Kalpar

Black Powder War, by Naomi Novik

Today I'm looking at the third book in the Temeraire series, Black Powder War. The book begins where Throne of Jade left off, with Temeraire, Captain Will Laurence, and still in China. The crew are planning to travel with the dragon carrier Allegiance back to Britain via the Cape of Good Hope when an emergency message from the admiralty arrives from overland. Temeraire and Laurence are ordered to head directly for Istanbul and take possession of three dragon eggs and return them to Scotland post haste. Considering our heroes are halfway around the world and there should be British dragons in the Mediterranean, they find these orders rather curious and it implies the military situation back home has deteriorated in the year since they left. After some wrangling, the crew decide to head back overland, hoping to shave at least some time off by avoiding waiting for repairs for the Allegiance and taking a more direct route.

A pretty significant chunk of the book is spent on getting Temeraire, Laurence, and company from China across the center of Asia and finally to Istanbul. Considering the terrain they have to cover includes some of the world's larger deserts this is hardly a simple task and our heroes have to face the challenges of feeding and watering a dragon when logistics are hardly easy, as well as fighting off brigands and feral dragons.

The last half of the book brings our characters out of the wilderness and back into the struggle of European politics. Arriving in Istanbul our protagonists find the British ambassador dead, his staff gone, and all requests for information regarding the purchase of dragon eggs blocked by a byzantine network of pashas and advisers. Eventually our heroes have to take matters into their own hands. Under the logic that the eggs have already been paid for and therefore are British property, the crew breaks out of the sultan's palace and absconds with the eggs. Unfortunately they lose one of the eggs during their escape, but more concerning still the egg of a valuable fire-breathing species is mere weeks away from hatching.

The final part of the book is probably what I enjoyed the most, and that's because Laurence and Temeraire head for the relatively safe harbor of Prussia. (My people). The Prussians have decided to bring their much-vaunted military against Napoleon and expect an easy victory. If you're a student of history like myself, then you realize that this is just a prelude to the Battle of Jena-Auerstedt where the Prussians were crushed by the modernized French forces, prompting a flurry of civil and military reforms in Prussia that enabled it to become a key player in the victorious Sixth Coalition. However Novik manages to capture the stunning overconfidence of the Prussians prior to their thrashing at Jena-Auerstedt and makes even me shake my head at the poor deluded fools. Despite their need to get back home to Britain, Laurence and Temeraire find themselves dragooned into Prussian service and if not unable, at least unwilling to leave the Prussians in the lurch. Apparently the British promised the Prussians the support of a wing of twenty dragons, but those dragons never arrived. This raises more questions about the situation back home in Britain and perhaps things have gotten worse while our characters have been away. Hopefully we'll get some answers in the next book.

Another thing I really enjoyed is when Iskierka, the dragon close to hatching finally does hatch. Appropriate for a fire-breathing dragon she is an absolute firecracker and from the moment she hatches she's ready to go into a fight with the French. I found her absolutely hilarious and I'm hoping to see more of her in the later books.

Overall, I think this was pretty good. There are some funny bits and I feel like Novik is at least incorporating dragons into Napoleonic Wars in a way that makes it plausible. As I said in my last review, if you like dragons and you like the Napoleonic Era, this is a book worth reading.

- Kalpar

His Majesty's Dragon & Throne of Jade, by Naomi Novik

Today I'm looking at the first two books of the Temeraire Series by Naomi Novik. I was loaned the first book, His Majesty's Dragon, by a friend some time ago but I didn't write a review because I realized there were nine books in the series and since I've got a to-read pile about a mile high at this point I decided to let it go. ...and then I realized that the library had at least some of the books in the series available as audiobooks that I could listen to at work so then I started Throne of Jade. Which means this will be a combined review of the first two books and then I'll start taking the books one at a time as I get to them.

These books are a combination of fantasy and historical fiction sort of like Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, although I think I make the comparison because this book is also set during the Napoleonic Wars. These books were basically described to me as ''Napoleonic Wars but with DRAGONS!'' And Novik really does take that concept and run with it, going so far as to create biological treatises on dragons as supplemental material for her universe which makes it all the more believable.

Our book begins with Captain Will Laurence, commander of the HMS Relaint, intercepts a French ship in the Atlantic. After a battle and boarding action Laurence and his crew discover the French had been carrying a dragon egg of an unknown species back to France and it's about to hatch. Laurence and his crew prepare the best they can but everyone's surprised when the dragon chooses Laurence for his companion. Laurence then receives an unexpected career shift from the Royal Navy to the Aerial Corps and the rest of the book is Laurence and Temeraire learning about their new life.

Obviously having dragons as an air force in the last great era of linear tactics can have dramatic shifts in how the Napoleonic Wars turned out, but I think Novik manages to put in enough explanation for why the Napoleonic Wars are still going. First the number of dragons, at least in Western Europe, is fairly small and they don't breed quickly so there's an incredibly finite supply of dragons. Secondly, within that number of dragons there are an even smaller number that have projectile weapons like fire or acid so the dragons don't make as large an air force as they might like. In fact, because a lot of the combat dragons are so freaking big the standard European practice is to have riflemen and bombadiers ride the dragon. The result is the dragons tend to fight each other and act as raiders rather than a strict air force.

The climax of the first book involves Temeraire and Laurence successfully foiling an aerial invasion of Britain by Napoleon, as well as discovering that Temeraire is in fact a Celestial Dragon, one of the rarest and exalted of the Chinese dragon breeds. The second book begins when a Chinese embassy arrives in Britain and is rather keen on getting Temeraire back. What follows is an expedition across the globe on the British dragon carrier H.M.S. Allegiance to reach China. China provides an extreme contrast because while dragons are rare in Europe, they are far more common in China to the point where dragons share cities with humans and even participate in civil examinations. This puts strain on Laurence's and Temeraire's relationship because dragons have so many more freedoms in China than in Europe. However Temeraire is ultimately attached to Laurence and to his adopted homeland of Britain and the war in Europe.

As I said, the concept is interesting although I do wonder about how my countrymen, the Prussians, adapt to the dragon situation and I'm hoping we'll see more of that in later books. If you like dragons and like the Napoleonic Wars, I think this is definitely a worthwhile choice.

- Kalpar