Sadly, Alise, who has a quick mind and a fascination with dragons that has led her to become the foremost expert in the area, is saddled with an unhappy marriage to a man, Hest, who is in love with someone else entirely. One of the protagonists is Alise Kincarron Finbok, a Bingtown trader's pampered wife, or so most people think. The dragons, unable to care for themselves, and abandoned by the great dragon Tintaglia, become a burden on the Rain Wilds villages. Those that did become dragons are only a shadow of true dragons, with malfunctioning wings, weak musculature and stunted brains in some cases. Few lived to make their cocoons and even fewer emerged intact. As the book opens, we learn the experiment was mostly unsuccessful.
This book picks up on the story of the sea serpents that struggled throughout the LiveShips series to reach the nesting grounds in the RainWilds, where they would become dragons, the first dragons in centuries.
I do believe it would be possible for a new reader to pick up this series without having read the previous ones, although it would be important to understand the significance of Wizardwood, the Live Ships, and the Chalcedean Empire to get the full flavor of what is going on. Happily, she began the novel with brand new characters, not wearing out the beloved ones from past series although some did have cameo parts.
How happy I was to discover she was writing a follow-up to the Liveships trilogy, set in the Rainwilds. I am a huge fan of Robin Hobb and have read every single one of her books with the exception of the Soldier Son series, which I couldn't get into. Fans will look forward to the finish wondering whether Kelsingra will prove to be a Dragon Haven or hell. However, what makes Dragon Keeper a keeper is the cast as the travelers human and dragon seems real while the menaces come from the land, the river and within. In some ways, the opening of Act Three (see the Liveship Traders and the Tawny Man sagas), is a coming of age duet.
The story line is mostly seen through the eyes of the two women as they face danger and treachery on the quest. Returning to the Tawny Man world with the first entry of a duology, Robin Hobb provides a superb fantasy. The journey along the deadly Rain Wild River will prove arduous with only the strong surviving. Among the selected are uneducated teenage Rain Wilds Thymara and overly-educated unhappy dragon guru Alise, wife of a Bingtown Trader. The Traders Council quickly reacts choosing special humans who contain mutations on their bodies to escort the young dragons to a different locale, the lost city of Kelsingra where they can be controlled easier away from the cities. These hatchlings seem substandard with many expected to die those who live must be controlled before their hunger drives them to Cassarik. However, the townsfolk are stunned when the cocoons left behind by the nomadic sea serpents rupture open releasing a new generation of dragons that must be controlled rapidly before they devastate the town towns. PAGES WILL BE DELETED OTHERWISE IF THEY ARE MISSING BASIC MARKUP.Years have passed since the last fatal hatching and the residents of Bingtown and Cassarik have become somewhat complacent as if those who died during the previous infestation never occurred. DON'T MAKE PAGES MANUALLY UNLESS A TEMPLATE IS BROKEN, AND REPORT IT THAT IS THE CASE. THIS SHOULD BE WORKING NOW, REPORT ANY ISSUES TO Janna2000, SelfCloak or RRabbit42. The Trope workshop specific templates can then be removed and it will be regarded as a regular trope page after being moved to the Main namespace. All new trope pages will be made with the "Trope Workshop" found on the "Troper Tools" menu and worked on until they have at least three examples.Pages that don't do this will be subject to deletion, with or without explanation. All new pages should use the preloadable templates feature on the edit page to add the appropriate basic page markup.
All images MUST now have proper attribution, those who neglect to assign at least the "fair use" licensing to an image may have it deleted.Failure to do so may result in deletion of contributions and blocks of users who refuse to learn to do so.
Before making a single edit, Tropedia EXPECTS our site policy and manual of style to be followed.