The Flight of Dragons by Peter Dickinson

The dragon novels I've been reading--the good and the bad--have given me a tendency to reminisce about the good ol' days…er…childhood. So I was thinking about "Flight of Dragons" (the animated movie) the other day and decided to see if it was based on a book. Lo and behold…

I was super excited to get this in the mail today and started reading it almost immediately! It's one of those books that I can't believe I got through childhood without having read at least once. Honestly, I'm shocked I didn't already own this. It's a great bestiary about dragons--mostly pertaining to their physical attributes, but also to habits like hoarding gold and magical abilities like hypnosis.

I have several arguments I would like to have with Dickinson regarding some of his claims. I do not think it at all evident or plausible that the females are water- and earth-bound while the males are the only ones to enjoy flight. I also doubt very much that the gas-chambers in a dragon grow from vertebrae. It seems more likely to me that these sacs grew suspended from vertebrae--otherwise I would think the bone around the chamber would be more likely to break and they would be unlikely to have the necessary flexibility or elasticity to release dragon by-product.

I was most impressed with his description of the hydrogen cycle of a dragon. I think it quite plausible that this flammable material would be easily emitted through the mouth or nostrils and sparked by another chemical to create fire. I also quite enjoyed the map of reported dragon sightings (I wonder about their origin), and the evolutionary diagram included in the book. All of the illustrations are wonderful and worth their weight in gold (figuratively), but these were some of my favorites as they were also quite informative.

I highly encourage those curious about dragons, dragon lore, and monster lore to check this book out of the local library. I can't say you'll agree with everything Dickinson writes, but you'll certainly get the chance to learn a lot about dragons from at least one scholar's research on the subject. And I think an adult can appreciate this just as much as an adolescent, if not more. Also, if you're interested in hearing a distinct take on Beowulf, Dickinson makes a case for all three monsters being dragons, so that's a pretty interesting section of this book, too.

~8/10~