E. E. Knight

Age of Fire — (2005-2007) Young adult. Publisher: After escaping those who killed his siblings, Young Auron, a rare, defenseless gray dragon, fears he might be the last of his breed. Armed with nothing but his claws and a boundless determination to survive, he sets off in search of his kind. But to find other dragons-or, at least, find out who's killing them off-Auron will have to search a world of mercenary elves, vicious humans, and dangers of all kinds. Finding allies in the strangest places-and himself along the way-Auron is on the trek of a lifetime.

Dragon Champion

Dragon Champion, the first Age of Fire novel, begins with a newborn whose initial impressions of the world are artfully depicted, but the fact that this newborn is a dragon makes it even more fun. E.E. Knight’s story follows the life and growth of a young dragon through interesting and perilous adventures.

Knight's world-building is creative; he mixes races, geography, and geo-politics to create a vibrant background. The story takes on an almost scientific tone at times as Knight explains some of the aspects of dragonkind in a way that makes sense to human readers. A good example of this is an explanation of why a dragon is able to breathe fire.

My favorite part of the story had to do with Knight’s depiction of the main bad guy. This is not your stereotypical wizard who is trying to destroy the world simply to be all-powerful. What the reader gets to sort through are the varying motivations that several groups are coping with and how perspective can strongly impact one’s outlook on what is right and wrong.

Dragon Champion was fairly well-paced and not too graphic or vulgar for a reader over the age of 13. Covering a mere 369 pages, this is not one of the spine shattering bruisers that have become so common. I look forward to reading the next book in the series, Dragon Avenger, because Dragon Champion left plenty of room for further adventure.  —John H.   Comments

Dragon Avenger

Dragon Avenger, the second installment in E.E. Knight’s Age of Fire, is a worthy addition to a good young adult series. This story's protagonist is the sister of Auron, the main character of the first book (Dragon Champion). Using an easy-to-follow storyline, Knight incorporates characters and concepts from his first book into the second.

Wistala has to forge a path in a world that is prejudiced against dragons — just like her brother did. She finds similar challenges and impediments, but ultimately finds enough allies to help her grow and learn. This is not challenging, demanding storytelling in any sense, but just a fun easy to read book.

Knight keeps the story light — it's not graphically violent and contains no themes that are too strong for a younger reader. Dragon Avenger is fun, exciting, and light enough to make for a quick rollick from a dragon’s perspective. —John H.   Comments

Dragon Outcast

As always, E.E. Knight brings us an action/adventure story filled with everybody's favorite fantasy creature: dragons.

One thing I have especially enjoyed about The Age of Fire is that you can pick up any of the novels and completely enjoy it as a stand-alone novel. Each of the books begins at the exact same time and location, yet each follows a different dragon. In Dragon Outcast, we learn the story of the Copper, Auron and Wistala’s sibling who was denied the egg shelf. In the previous two books the Copper was given a villainous cast, as it was he who led the Dragonblade and the Dwarves to his family’s cave. But now we learn that all is not as it seems, and that the Copper’s motivations were purer than we thought. And most especially, we learn the fate of the Dragonblade, an enigma from the first two books.

Dragon Outcast follows the Copper as he grows from hatchling to full fledged dragon. Hideously scarred and damaged by being outcast from his family, he is forced to make his own way in the world. Hearing of a glorious place called the Lavadome, where dragons live in peace together, the Copper seeks it out. His journey takes him underground from his parent’s cave to the very feet of the Tyr, the leader of the Lavadome. Yet his journey has damaged his body (eye, leg, and wing), and acceptance is hard to find in the body-conscious society of the Lavadome. The Copper must make a name for himself, and what follows makes for an interesting story as he grows from drake into dragon.

Ironically, where in the previous two books E. E. Knight has Auron and Wistala spend a great deal of time seeking the company of other dragons and not finding it, the Copper, an outcast, finds it rather easily. Yet he is the least suited for it with his damaged body. Knight weaves together an interesting dragon society, one that is believable based on the traditional nature of dragons. Their ferocity, their territorial nature, and their intelligence all make for a culture that is both believable and perched on a precipice, ready to collapse at any moment. With his arrival, the Copper provides the catalyst for its change.

This was probably the strongest book of The Age of Fire. The plot is tight and the story does not have the elongated feel of Dragon Champion or some of the random plot elements of Dragon Avenger. Knight perhaps could work on his action sequences a bit, as it was occasionally hard to understand how the action related to the space around the character.

I think at times that Knight also assumes we have knowledge that we do not. His dialogue will sometimes be structured to hint at prior knowledge that he failed to give us earlier in the novel. Usually, I was able to infer the information, and it was usually something to do with dragon society that was not really important to the story anyway, but I would have appreciated an explanation.

All in all, E.E. Knight continues to be a wonderful writer. He has taken dragons and made them both more and less than what the fairy tales gave us. Many stories of dragons make them majestic and helpful, or split them into “good” and “evil” dragons usually dependent on scale color. But Knight’s dragons are all of a whole, and color has nothing to do with personality. Good and evil designations are dependent on the nature of the dragon in question. The Copper is our hero, and anyone who has ever felt marginalized will find they are very able to identify with the Copper’s struggles for recognition.

I highly recommend Dragon Outcast. And if you have trouble finding the first two books, don’t worry, you can read this one and go back to the other two. The whole series is one of those rare ones that I will actually and go back and read, because each novel adds depth to the others. Here’s to The Age of Fire, a series of extraordinary novels! —J.O.   Comments
FanLit thanks John Ottinger III from Grasping for the Wind for contributing this guest review.