I finished Dragonslayer by Tui T. Sutherland. I enjoyed the book. The story has three human point-of-view (POV) characters and a few scenes that are the human POV of scenes that were from various dragons’ POVs in the first five books of the Wings of Fire series. That overlapping of events was fun.
The first time I remember encountering overlapping events in books was reading The Masterharper of Pern by Anne McCaffrey. That book had Masterharper Robinton’s POV of scenes that in Dragonflight were from Lessa’s POV. I enjoyed seeing those scenes from different perspectives as well as seeing events in those scenes that were off screen in the other book.
I wanted to experiment with doing overlapping events between stories. At about the two-thirds point in my current project, the story overlaps a story I previously wrote. I’m not to that point in writing the story yet, but I look forward to delving into those scenes from a different perspective and providing details that were off screen in the first story.
I have a little more to say about Dragonslayer. A few spoilers follow.
I fell in love with the dragon Sky. He’s the human Wren’s friend and one of the main non-POV characters in the story. He loved watching snails and when he met his first baby turtle, he nearly fainted with joy.
“SO CUTE,” Sky warbled, near tears. He lay down beside the turtle and rested his head on his front claws. “I looooooooooooooooooooooooove it. Wren! Look at its little head. Look at its little feet! It is the sweetest, best little animal in the whole history of the universe.”
I also liked the dragon called Sweetface. Her actual name turned out to be Cereus (which is a type of cactus).
When Sky’s friend Wren spoke to Cereus in the dragon language, Cereus, believing humans can’t actually speak, said to Sky, “She makes dragon noises! You’ve trained her so well! That’s the cutest thing I’ve ever seen!”
When Wren told Cereus that she wasn’t making dragon noises, she was speaking Dragon and to stop being a dimwit, Cereus said to Sky, “Awwwwwwwmygoodness, I love her! I want to snuggle her and put little hats on her!”
Later, Sky told Wren, “You’re extremely lovable. Of course, you would be more lovable in a little hat…”
I enjoyed the interaction between Wren and Sky. That is the kind of connections I love exploring in my stories.
I recommend the entire Wings of Fire series by Tui T. Sutherland.
