Between Dragons and Their Wrath (The Shattered Kingdom, #1) by Devin Madson on August 27, 2024
Genres: Fantasy, LGBTQ
Pages: 480
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Source: Orbit Books
From Aurealis Award‑nominated author Devin Madson comes a new rip-roaring epic fantasy full of dragons, alchemical magic, and forbidden romance that unfolds as three people in a shattered empire become entangled in a looming revolution.The old kingdom of Paicha has been split into city states, but there are those who seek to reunite the shattered realm-by force if necessary. Amidst the turmoil there are three who will find their destinies inextricably tangled. Tesha is a glassblower's apprentice who becomes a tribute bride when her city is conquered by the south. In the enemy's court, she's perfectly placed to sabotage them, but her heart has other plans. Naili is a laundress in the house of an eccentric alchemist who is awakening to strange new powers. When radicals approach her, she faces a choice between keeping her magic to herself and using it to change the world. And in the desolate Shield Mountains, dragon rider Ash protects the cities from the monsters in the Iipao sands beyond. But, soon he'll have to learn how to protect his dragon when hunters unlock the secret to killing them. As war sweeps across the land, Tesha, Naili, and Ash must fight for survival against political enemies, dragon hunters, and monsters both within and without. Praise for Devin 'This is a tale that hits all the right spots. Imaginative world-building, a pace that builds perfectly to a heart-pounding finale and captivating, believable characters. There's a lot to love here. Highly recommended' John Gwynn, author of Shadow of the Gods'Breathtakingly triumphant . . . it has become one of my favourite books of all time . . . a gripping, evocative hurricane of emotions that constantly took my breath away' Petrik Leo, Novel Notions
Between Dragons and Their Wrath is a bit of a challenge for me to rate. While I liked the novel, it was misrepresented by the synopsis, suffered from pacing issues, and felt mainly like a setup for the sequel. Even more tragically, there were very few of the eponymous dragons. That being said, there was enough political intrigue, mystery, and new ideas to keep me invested in the book.
Between Dragons and Their Wrath has some really cool concepts. There’s some unique ideas at play here, like girls sprouting plants and magical abilities, dragon riders being conscripted and forced to consume drugs in order to talk to their dragons, scale piercing bullets, and dread alchemists. Unfortunately a lot of the execution here is a misfire, as the novel dedicates a lot of page space to less interesting things. For instance, there’s probably less than ten minutes dedicated to dragons in the entire book, let alone their wrath. Despite the odd priorities of the book and the lulls in the action, it only made me more compelled to get the next interesting scene where something more was uncovered.
“Agreeing to this plan of theirs gets me right into the heart of Emora, into the reacher’s family. From there I can tear them all down.”
Unfortunately, the reveals are few and far apart, with the world-building being rather vague. However, I think a lot of this is purposeful in order to keep things mysterious for certain discoveries. Regardless, there is a lot at stake politically and also on another front, which requires dragon riders to keep monsters at bay. Each of the narrators are in great positions to comment on different aspects of the mysterious events at play. Tesh infiltrates a high profile family as an insult bride and an assassin. Ashadi is the eldest son of the same noble family, exiled to life as a dragon rider for daring to go against the grain of his family. And Naili is a laundress for an alchemist who starts developing powers of her own after exposure to the alchemist’s experiments.
“But around here answers are earned, not given.”
Regrettably, I didn’t particularly like any of these characters. Out of all of them, I found Tesh to be the most relatable. However, her backstory was way too vague—she’s super patriotic, which is why she decided to dump her secretly noble boyfriend, infiltrate the upper class, become an insult bride (a concept that is frustratingly never really given much explanation), with the goal of assassinating the most powerful man in the realm, but we never learn from where this patriotic zeal of hers stems. This seems like a pretty fundamental thing to establish about a character willing to risk her life for a cause. Without any kind of tragic backstory, it’s harder to feel a connection. And with her primary personality trait being loyalty to her country, it’s a little off-putting when she suddenly develops a conscience and questioning her actions towards the people she swore were her enemies.
Another issue I had with the characters is that everyone, male and female, thinks with their nether regions. Nobody has any restraint. It’s hard to sympathize with them when they choose to throw caution to the winds over and over again. And these scenes feel very out of place, such as a thief suddenly getting bent over by the very person from whom they’re stealing. I’m not here to shame anyone for their interests, but I’m baffled by these scenes and their purpose. They don’t add anything to the plot and, in fact, usually interrupt them. It gets very tedious reading about the urges of the characters all of the time, especially Naili who seems to be dying at all times due to her insatiable thirst for anything with a pulse. I could not fathom if these scenes are supposed to be edgy or hot, but they’re honestly more bewildering than anything else. Time and place, people, (and maybe not with the very same people who actively trying to hurt the character in question).
“Still a dreamer, huh. You cannot fix this, Nai, just like you cannot fix this city or this world. This is the world we live in, and this is the world we’ll die in. You just have to pick how you want to live. Or die.”
Despite these weird scenes, I really enjoyed watching the different worlds of the characters slowly collide over the course of Between Dragons and their Wrath. It was very cool to see the ripple effects of one character’s actions reach the others, even if they didn’t meet each other in person. The build up of them all meeting creates quite a lot of tension and curiosity, so I’m looking forward to the characters actually physically meeting up in future entries of the series. And since the novel ended with a rather big reveal about the world itself and there’s clearly a lot more going on then what even the characters know, I’m excited to see where it all goes in future entries of the series.
I would recommend Between Dragons and Their Wrath to readers who can adjust their expectations without being too annoyed, as the blurb and marketing for the novel seem to be purposefully misleading. If readers can go into the novel looking for a fantasy novel filled mostly with political intrigue and very little action or actual dragons, they will be more likely to enjoy it.
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You are so right about the dragons: we don’t see enough of them!! And the synopsis is not good.
I enjoyed a lot the secondary characters, I think they have a lot of potential!!
I am hoping we will see a lot more of them in the sequel! I agree–I don’t think the synopsis did the novel a service, and instead gave readers false expectations.
I am so tired of books that promise dragons and then don’t really deliver! Not particularly likable characters certainly don’t help either – I think it’s good that I passed on this one.
I completely agree–it’s such a tease!