While the quality of the writing was good, I had reservations to even consider reading it, due to such a 'cliche' title as "Dragonslayer". But then, I thought, maybe this was going to be a comedic farce of all of those nonsensical, fairytale dragonslayer stories written to amuse small children who do not understand how impossible it would really be to kill something like a large, intelligent dragon with medieval technology.
As I read the story I discovered how uncomfortably similar it was to the Disney Children's film of the same name. The "Dragonslayer" is a teenage girl, instead of a teenage boy, and his 'magic' spear has now become a pair of 'magic swords'. hmmm.
And like nearly every other predictable dragonslayer yarn, the story takes place in an implausible, unblievable "Never-Neverland" where dragons seem to exist only for the convenience of dragonslayers to kill them to prove how brave they are. As every scientist would confirm, if large carnivorous dinosaurs somehow survived extinction, there would be no humans today. They would have devoured our primitive ancestors with total impunity. But here, and in so many other 'dragonslayer stories' we have creatures far more dangerous than any dinosaur almost on the verge of extinction, apparently due to all of the brave dragonslayers, who even include teenage girls who had never waved a sword in anger prior to killing their first dragon!
In reality, the ONLY way a world with large, intelligent dragons and humans could co-exist is if the dragons deliberately didn't eat the early hominids into extinction. (Or perhaps primitive apemen had 'magic sharpened sticks', much like the girls magic swords?) , So in a realistic scenario, dragons would actually have to be the protectors of mankind (as in the lore of so many human cultures), rather than just a convenient monster that appears out of nowhere for teenage girl dragonslayers to slay.
And this brings us to the point that since the dragons have apparently been driven to near extinction, according to the story, they will actually the the underdogs, and invoke pity from the reader. And it is no wonder they are nearly extinct if a little girl can "slaughter one like a sheep". Who would even care to read more of this story, for with her god-like powers, how could she ever be placed in danger?
The answer is that it is highly unlikely any adult lover of fantasy stories would bother reading more. The story is believable only to small children, some of who might like to fantsize they are 'mighty dragonslayers' like this teenage girl in the story is made out to be.
Here is the contrast between this, and one of the most succesful fantasy series of recent times - Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth cycle. The young man in this series also has a 'magic sword', but knows he could never kill a dragon with it. Instead, we see a far more clever plot twist in that he must gain the dragon's gratitude to help him on his quest, a creature that still promises might eat him someday!
These books are international best sellers and have inspired a T.V series because they are fresh and clever and lack the predictable, unbelievable, "hero slays dragon" cliche' just like this one in the story being reviewed. And worse, this one is even called Dragonslayer, just lie the Disney movie!
In the mainstream world, it is common to make fun of the dragonslayer cliche' as we see in the blockbuster comedy Shrek, as evidenced by all of the charred armor around the castle. This is becasue most adults understand how ridiculous the idea of a man with a sword killing a large, intelligent dragon (let alone a teenage girl with no combat experience).. In the Middle Ages, the dragon depicted being slain by St. George is often no bigger than a goat because people back then understood how dangerous even a goat sized dragon would be! But then, people back then really understood the capabilities of men with swords fighting dangerous animals, unlike so many fantasy writers of today, who have no idea how impossible fighting something like a dragon would really be.
The action in this story did not seem believable at all to me, and suggests the writer knows very little about martial arts or animal and human capabilities.
I do think the author is a capable writer however, and might be able to write interesting fantasy if such blatantly cliche' and unblievable things like "tenagers with magic swords slaying mighty dragons", can be avoided at all costs. That story has been written a thousand times before.
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