Review: The Dragondain by Richard Due

Title: The Dragondain
Author: Richard Due
Format: Ebook
Publisher: Gibbering Gnome
Publish Date: September 1, 2012
Source: I received a copy from the author; however, this did not affect my review.

Why You're Reading This Book:

• You like fantasy.
• You like great world-building.

What's the Story?:

From Goodreads.com: "It's the middle of the night, you need to send your brother to the Moon Realm, and he won’t wake up. So you improvise. . . .

When a confused Jasper awakes, he's convinced he's dreaming. But by the time he meets Greydor, Jasper understands that this is no dream. In fact, persuading the King of the Rinn to work with the men of Dain to defeat their common enemy is a nightmare. Then there’s the other side of the coin: convincing Tavin and Dubb that saddling a Rinn isn’t certain death. (“It’ll be fun!”) And perhaps even a greater worry: can he make friends with Dubb’s daughter Darce before she punches his lights out?

Lily has problems, too. There’s a little mousie scratching in her closet. Or at least, it sounds like a little mousie. Oh, and her second confrontation with Curse, and trying to form her first peerin. (Don’t you have to be from Dain to do that?) And where’s Ebb?

Only one thing is certain. Now that Lily and Jasper have entered the Moon Realm, nothing can ever be the same again."

My Two Cents:

As the author mentions in his author blurb at the end of the book that he came up for the idea of The Moon Realm books when telling bedtime stories to his children. This is exactly the kind of story that you want as a bedtime story. This is a great book for both adults looking for a great story as well as little ones who need a great story before drifting off to sleep. There is definitely wide appeal here!

The book is incredibly imaginative and the story is rich with great detail, great world-building, and great characters. I really, really loved this latest adventure and I am anxious to go back to the Moon Realm in the next book. Those who loved books and movies like the Chronicles of Narnia and the Neverending Story (definitely some favorites from my own childhood) will definitely find something to love about this book.

This is the second book in the Moon Realm series and I would say that in order to understand this book, you should probably read the first book in the series, The Moon Coin, in order to understand everything that is going on in The Dragondain. In this book, the readers get to learn more about the Moon Realm and the battle that is being waged. Jasper and Lily are still trying to find out what happened to their beloved Uncle Ebb. There are some secrets uncovered in this book but there is so much left to know.

The Dragondain picks right up where The Moon Coin left off. Because it has been several months since I read The Moon Coin, I had forgotten some of what happened in the first book, which made some of the second book a little difficult to get through. Once I hit a stride, I really hit a stride. The writing is really, really good. There are so many creative and fantastic creatures in the book, which I really enjoyed. The world building is fantastic. The world building is probably still my favorite part of these books.

While I liked The Moon Coin a little bit better than this book (there is a lot more explanation in the first book), this is still most definitely a solid read!

Bottom line: A great fantasy with broad appeal!