Book Review

Kazin's Quest, Carey Scheppner

First of The Dragonmage Trilogy, it's an enjoyable fantasy yarn. And I sincerely mean that. I just don't think this trilogy is for me.

It centers around a newly trained mage who by chance is turned into a Dragonmage, that is, he gains the ability to change into a dragon and back at will. He gathers a group of companions together to fulfill a prophecy and defeat a great necromancer. The Dragonmage aspect of it is actually a cool story by itself apart from all the rest and I don't think quite enough time is devoted to it. Instead it gets busy filling the world with a few too many different types of creatures for me to process. I'm all for a little variation from the standard fantasy formula of humans, elves, dwarves, wizards, and generic monstrosities like orcs. But including with these mermaids, zombies, centaurs, minotaurs, two races of upright reptilians - mages and archer warriors, pegasi, and a unicorn just seems to stretch the world a little thin and gives it a lack of depth.

I see it as being written for Dungeons and Dragons or video game players. The story plays out like like an average gamer campaign and the characters "level up" by finding special weapons and being suddenly positioned to acquire new skills. It ends up being a series of battle sequences into which most of the passionate writing is poured with the story being a relatively thin thread that ties them together with slightly juvenile humor. 

But I meant it when I said it had enjoyable aspects... Things that could have been fleshed out more thoroughly in their own separate stories. The concept of the Dragonmage was one but I also really liked the minotaur political structure and intrigue. The dwarves also had a uniqueness to them that felt lacking since they were also fairly typical. I'm actually not sure how to feel about a silly lovesick elf as opposed to the standard arrogant and dissociated kind in the prominent elf role, but these are certainly things worth exploring.

I absolutely recommend it for fans of this particular subset of fantasy genre. It's good, it's just not my favorite.