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coraaHis Majesty's Dragon
, by Naomi Novik
And finally, some fiction!
I admit: it took me so long to read this book in part because I'd had it recommended from all sides, and I was afraid it wouldn't live up to the hype. So I let the hype die down a little before I cracked it open -- and I'm glad I did finally read it, because this is a fun, fun book. Very enjoyable indeed.
His Majesty's Dragon begins when Napoleonic-era naval captain William Laurence captures a French ship carrying a dragon egg -- a dragon egg close to hatching. As dragons are valuable in the Aerial Corps (a kind of air force made up of dragons and their handlers) and the country is currently at war, it would be a gross waste to allow the dragon to go feral. (If a dragon doesn't accept the harness from a human hand shortly after he or she is hatched, that dragon will never voluntarily ally with humans thereafter.) The men of his ship must therefore attempt to harness the dragon, and, unfortunately for him, Laurence is the one the dragon wants. Laurence names the dragon Temeraire -- and then is snatched away from his position, the Navy, and his family, to join the mysterious Aerial Corps and fly, rather than sail, to war on behalf of England.
Because the book was billed to me as 'Napoleonic War with dragons,' I expected that the setting would make or break it for me, but that wasn't the case -- though the setting is interesting enough, it's the characters that made the book for me. Hands-down my favorite thing was the relationship between Laurence and Temeraire. It's clear from the book that, while the dragon is inclined to imprint on a particular person at hatching (much like, say, a baby duck), the imprinting isn't any kind of magical soulbond, as with other bonded-companion-animal stories. It's a friendship: a friendship predisposed to being very strong, but still, a friendship. (It has parental overtones when the dragon is new-hatched, but that fades away with time.) It takes work on the parts of both parties and yet, because of that, it is far more rewarding to me than if it had been instalove complete with rainbows and sparkles and Never Being Alone Again. (Indeed, the dragons and humans don't have any kind of telepathy or empathic bond at all, that I can see -- the dragons speak out loud, in human language, and they and their human companions bond by spending time together. And if the humans and dragons don't spend time together, their relationship gets strained and dysfunctional.) It's a really genuine, solid connection, and I love to read about strong friendships, so this just made me grin foolishly all through.
Mostly, though, I loved the book because I loved Temeraire himself. He's got a personality of his own -- smart, curious, thoughtful, sweet-tempered, a little bit elegant. He gives the impression of being very smart and dignified but also being young. He likes to read (or, well, be read to, because of the scale problem) and is fascinated by history, science, mathematics. He's just -- I love Temeraire. Really, I love that the dragon characters are characters in their own rights. The dragons Celeritas, Lily and Maximus all had distinct personalities, and while they didn't get all that much 'screen time' (all of the other characters are very much secondary to Laurence and Temeraire, who are the heart of the book), they're pretty much as well-developed as comparable human characters.
I could certainly nitpick things. It seems a bit, uh, implausible to me that the world is full of dragons, the Americas host a thriving Incan empire, and so on -- and yet those major changes haven't altered the track of history in England/France at all, such that not only is there still a Napoleonic war but all the major players seem to be the same -- and in a lot of ways Laurence is sort of too good, although he's genuinely likable enough, to me, to escape being irritating about it. But here's the thing: the book hit me in a very reading-for-fun-and-pleasure place, and though I can see the flaws, I don't want to nitpick them. I want to just spend a few hours with Laurence and Temeraire and grin at the image of Regency London with dragons flying overhead.
One thing I really liked was that I kept thinking of questions and then putting them aside -- only to be surprised and delighted to find that the book did answer them. Like: how the hell does the dragon know the language of the people it hatches near? I had expected to handwave that one, and then it got a real answer. I loved a lot of the setting details, too -- the fact that a dragon doesn't just carry one rider into battle, but a whole crew of gunners, bombers, lookouts, and people who maintain the harnesses. That Laurence wasn't instantly delighted by having his entire life rewritten and turned upside-down by the sudden introduction of a dragon. That dragons are much longer-lived than their handlers, and so a dragon will often accept a child or relative of their initial handler as a new handler, because they share a connection (and share the dragon's grief).
One thing that I was initially disappointed with was the fact that, because the rest of the Napoleonic setting -- apart from the dragons -- seems to be mostly faithful(? -- I admit, I am not a Napoleonic expert), I assumed there wouldn't be many central female characters, or at least not many central human female characters. It is a war story, after all, and it's not like there were a ton of women in the military in the early 1800s. But as it turns out, one of the particular breeds of dragon (the Longwing, which is one of England's most valuable breeds because it can spit powerful acid) will only accept a female handler. So there were a few female characters after all, and I do hope we see more of them.
One thing that's niggling me is that the dragons are clearly intelligent, or at least as variable in intelligence as humans. Temeraire is specifically mentioned as being unusually smart (his breed was bred by the Chinese -- the world's dragon experts -- specifically for intelligence), but that means that he wants to learn higher math and physics. Lily, Maximus and Celeritas seem to be human-level smart, and while one particular dragon, Volly, is not very bright, that seems to be the exception. (Or perhaps all of his breed are not very bright, as it seems that he was bred for incredible speed and smarts fell by the wayside.) And yet, and yet -- the dragons are bred by humans, are bound for life to the Aerial Corps (admittedly, so are the humans who harness them, but it seems that Laurence's position of having been forced into it is highly unusual), and, if they are not treated well by their human handlers, don't seem to have much recourse. It's just the fact that most handlers do love their dragons that protects them, and that seems a thin protection. I am hoping that this is addressed in some way in future books -- and I'm optimistic that they will, because Temeraire's bright, inquisitive nature just demands it.
But yeah, this was a really good time, not deep but a quick and entertaining read. If you like fantasy, are entertained by the idea of 'Napoleonic War with dragons,' or like stories with likable characters and strong friendships, I'd recommend it. And now I have to go read the sequels!
, by Naomi NovikAnd finally, some fiction!
I admit: it took me so long to read this book in part because I'd had it recommended from all sides, and I was afraid it wouldn't live up to the hype. So I let the hype die down a little before I cracked it open -- and I'm glad I did finally read it, because this is a fun, fun book. Very enjoyable indeed.
His Majesty's Dragon begins when Napoleonic-era naval captain William Laurence captures a French ship carrying a dragon egg -- a dragon egg close to hatching. As dragons are valuable in the Aerial Corps (a kind of air force made up of dragons and their handlers) and the country is currently at war, it would be a gross waste to allow the dragon to go feral. (If a dragon doesn't accept the harness from a human hand shortly after he or she is hatched, that dragon will never voluntarily ally with humans thereafter.) The men of his ship must therefore attempt to harness the dragon, and, unfortunately for him, Laurence is the one the dragon wants. Laurence names the dragon Temeraire -- and then is snatched away from his position, the Navy, and his family, to join the mysterious Aerial Corps and fly, rather than sail, to war on behalf of England.
Because the book was billed to me as 'Napoleonic War with dragons,' I expected that the setting would make or break it for me, but that wasn't the case -- though the setting is interesting enough, it's the characters that made the book for me. Hands-down my favorite thing was the relationship between Laurence and Temeraire. It's clear from the book that, while the dragon is inclined to imprint on a particular person at hatching (much like, say, a baby duck), the imprinting isn't any kind of magical soulbond, as with other bonded-companion-animal stories. It's a friendship: a friendship predisposed to being very strong, but still, a friendship. (It has parental overtones when the dragon is new-hatched, but that fades away with time.) It takes work on the parts of both parties and yet, because of that, it is far more rewarding to me than if it had been instalove complete with rainbows and sparkles and Never Being Alone Again. (Indeed, the dragons and humans don't have any kind of telepathy or empathic bond at all, that I can see -- the dragons speak out loud, in human language, and they and their human companions bond by spending time together. And if the humans and dragons don't spend time together, their relationship gets strained and dysfunctional.) It's a really genuine, solid connection, and I love to read about strong friendships, so this just made me grin foolishly all through.
Mostly, though, I loved the book because I loved Temeraire himself. He's got a personality of his own -- smart, curious, thoughtful, sweet-tempered, a little bit elegant. He gives the impression of being very smart and dignified but also being young. He likes to read (or, well, be read to, because of the scale problem) and is fascinated by history, science, mathematics. He's just -- I love Temeraire. Really, I love that the dragon characters are characters in their own rights. The dragons Celeritas, Lily and Maximus all had distinct personalities, and while they didn't get all that much 'screen time' (all of the other characters are very much secondary to Laurence and Temeraire, who are the heart of the book), they're pretty much as well-developed as comparable human characters.
I could certainly nitpick things. It seems a bit, uh, implausible to me that the world is full of dragons, the Americas host a thriving Incan empire, and so on -- and yet those major changes haven't altered the track of history in England/France at all, such that not only is there still a Napoleonic war but all the major players seem to be the same -- and in a lot of ways Laurence is sort of too good, although he's genuinely likable enough, to me, to escape being irritating about it. But here's the thing: the book hit me in a very reading-for-fun-and-pleasure place, and though I can see the flaws, I don't want to nitpick them. I want to just spend a few hours with Laurence and Temeraire and grin at the image of Regency London with dragons flying overhead.
One thing I really liked was that I kept thinking of questions and then putting them aside -- only to be surprised and delighted to find that the book did answer them. Like: how the hell does the dragon know the language of the people it hatches near? I had expected to handwave that one, and then it got a real answer. I loved a lot of the setting details, too -- the fact that a dragon doesn't just carry one rider into battle, but a whole crew of gunners, bombers, lookouts, and people who maintain the harnesses. That Laurence wasn't instantly delighted by having his entire life rewritten and turned upside-down by the sudden introduction of a dragon. That dragons are much longer-lived than their handlers, and so a dragon will often accept a child or relative of their initial handler as a new handler, because they share a connection (and share the dragon's grief).
One thing that I was initially disappointed with was the fact that, because the rest of the Napoleonic setting -- apart from the dragons -- seems to be mostly faithful(? -- I admit, I am not a Napoleonic expert), I assumed there wouldn't be many central female characters, or at least not many central human female characters. It is a war story, after all, and it's not like there were a ton of women in the military in the early 1800s. But as it turns out, one of the particular breeds of dragon (the Longwing, which is one of England's most valuable breeds because it can spit powerful acid) will only accept a female handler. So there were a few female characters after all, and I do hope we see more of them.
One thing that's niggling me is that the dragons are clearly intelligent, or at least as variable in intelligence as humans. Temeraire is specifically mentioned as being unusually smart (his breed was bred by the Chinese -- the world's dragon experts -- specifically for intelligence), but that means that he wants to learn higher math and physics. Lily, Maximus and Celeritas seem to be human-level smart, and while one particular dragon, Volly, is not very bright, that seems to be the exception. (Or perhaps all of his breed are not very bright, as it seems that he was bred for incredible speed and smarts fell by the wayside.) And yet, and yet -- the dragons are bred by humans, are bound for life to the Aerial Corps (admittedly, so are the humans who harness them, but it seems that Laurence's position of having been forced into it is highly unusual), and, if they are not treated well by their human handlers, don't seem to have much recourse. It's just the fact that most handlers do love their dragons that protects them, and that seems a thin protection. I am hoping that this is addressed in some way in future books -- and I'm optimistic that they will, because Temeraire's bright, inquisitive nature just demands it.
But yeah, this was a really good time, not deep but a quick and entertaining read. If you like fantasy, are entertained by the idea of 'Napoleonic War with dragons,' or like stories with likable characters and strong friendships, I'd recommend it. And now I have to go read the sequels!
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Date: 2009-02-02 05:52 am (UTC)If you lived in the Timberland Regional Library system, you could win all sorts of prizes in their adult winter reading program.
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Date: 2009-02-02 06:12 am (UTC)(Truth is, I'm actually up to book #10, but I haven't figured out what, if anything, to say about several of the books yet. I might do a roundup post where I write just a short paragraph about books that don't require or merit more analysis/description.)
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Date: 2009-02-02 06:14 am (UTC)Go you!
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Date: 2009-02-02 06:25 am (UTC)I used to go through a book every two or three days, lately i've been lucky to manage a book every week or two =P
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Date: 2009-02-02 06:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-02 06:25 am (UTC)That would be a yes :)
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Date: 2009-02-02 06:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-02 06:36 am (UTC)I was re-reading His Majesty's Dragon (or maybe it was one of the later books) a while back and noticing that some elements could almost have been lifted from a romance plot. Very charming, I thought.
Now you've made me want to read the most recent book, and it's not out in paperback yet. Sigh. (My one major nitpick with Naomi Novik is her tendency to end books with cliffhangers...)
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Date: 2009-02-02 06:48 am (UTC)Interestingly, while it's clearly playing on romantic tropes, and while it's not hard for me to see 'slashy' subtexts in books, I didn't really ping on it that way. I think it's partly the pure physical difference of it (not only is Temeraire not human, he's not humanoid, and he's an order of magnitude bigger than Laurence), but it's mostly that Laurence's role is initially so parental, even though he and Temeraire are on a more equal footing by the end. To some extent the 'I would do anything for you' also seems to tie into a parent/child dynamic -- but one that works both ways; the dragons' mother-bear tendency to get violent in defense of their handlers refutes any interpretation in which the humans always take the parent role.
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Date: 2009-02-02 07:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-02 05:43 pm (UTC)Yeah, I always have to turn the nitpicky part of my brain off while reading alternate-universe stuff, because it just doesn't make sense for some things to be so different while others remain exactly the same. I'm willing to go along for the ride here, though, because I like these books so much.
If you love Temeraire, then you'll really like the latest novel in the series, Victory of Eagles, which has a whole, long, wonderful Temeraire POV section.
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Date: 2009-02-02 08:38 pm (UTC)I'm generally willing to accept the parallel history despite fundamental early split in the universes with fantasy books because, well, it's fantasy. Magic can do whatever it wants, right? :) (BTW, see "Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell" for another example where magic has been around forever and had significant effects on history, and yet they're still fighting Napoleon.)
When it gets really annoying is when someone tries to do the same thing with a SF book, where there's no "logical" justification for it. Turtledove does this a lot in his "the South wins the Civil War" series. Despite a major divergence in the 1860s he's still got historical people showing up in the books into the 1940s (albeit with different career paths,) and he's not even the worst of the offenders (though he is one of the more prolific ones.)
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Date: 2009-02-02 11:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-02 11:39 pm (UTC)And yes, Temeraire POV sounds wonderful!
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Date: 2009-02-04 05:59 pm (UTC)I haven't read much historical fantasy of this type, but my reaction to this is, "Well, yes, it is likely that some big alterations in history over there would also likely lead to large alterations over here, and I can see the desire to question why it hasn't. On the other hand, it is merely unlikely that changes wouldn't propagate, not entirely implausible, and is the presented course of history more implausible than... um, dragons?"
My point, I guess, is that it's funny where we're willing to suspend our disbelief, vs. where we insist on nitpicking (and I'm just as likely to fall victim to this myself, btw).
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Date: 2009-02-05 11:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-05 11:50 pm (UTC)