Reviewed by Allison Fraclose for TeensReadToo.com

For his entire life, Jacob Mendoza has lived in Smokehill National Park, one of the last and largest wildlife preserves for Draco australiensis in the world. His father, who heads the Institute dedicated to the study of the endangered dragons, has kept a tight leash on him since Jacob's mother died while on sabbatical a few years ago. Finally, though, Jacob's father has agreed to let him finally go on his first solo overnight stay deep in the park.

Although not as excited as he probably would have been about it before his mother's death, Jacob hikes out on his own, determined to cover some good ground before he has to meet up with the head Ranger the following morning. However, his plans for doing so are cut short when he comes across a horrific site.

A wounded mother dragon who has just given birth lies next to the remains of the poacher who presumably attacked her. Jacob creeps up to the massive creature and finds himself drowning in her eyes before she dies, leaving him with strange sensations of anger, despair, and hope swirling inside him. Stunned and crying, he begins to stumble away, passing by her babies who are now scattered on the ground...and he notices that one is still alive.

Instinct takes over, and Jacob now finds himself a surrogate mother for a creature that nobody knows how to raise. What's worse is that, now that a dragon has killed a human, all of Smokehill may be gravely in danger, for, not only is it against the law to kill a dragon, but it is also against the law to save one's life.

Although I enjoyed watching the bonding of Jacob and his foundling, and the descriptions of some of these otherworldly sensations impressed me, I found this book very difficult to read. Jacob as narrator tends to ramble a lot, and he "speaks" in an extremely informal manner. However, some readers may find this style more appealing and easier to understand than traditional narration. The idea of a dragon preserve is nevertheless an appealing one, and I think that any fans of dragons may find this story fascinating if for that reason only. ( )

The synopsis of this book put it on my back-burner until a craving for more Robin McKinley finally drove me out to buy it. I'm glad I gave in to the impulse, as once again, however outside my normal genre, Robin McKinley created a fascinating book that I find myself pondering and talking about weeks after completion. It doesn't matter what subject she tackles, her characters are just so damn interesting! ( )

There was nothing compelling to put it simply. I expected more excitement and adventure and less modern-day things. Overall, not at all what I expected and thoroughly confusing. AHS/EK

Distinctly charming, in a kind of in your face teenaged way.

The teenaged protagonist Jake is retrospectively writing his memoirs now that he's famous, of the events that made him famous. He lives in Smokehill, the only dragon preserve in america, and one of only three in the world. It all started when he was 14 and allowed out for his first solo overnight in the wilderness preserve. It so happened that just where he was camping a mother dragon was dying, and fortunately he was there to rescue one of the babies. Whom he called Lois. The reason the mother was dying was that a rich kid had broached (never explained how) Smokehill's impresive security and killed her - and of course been killed in turn. Dragon's being a lot tougher than one puny human no matter how well armed. The first recorded instance of a dragon killing a human of course lead to a lot of inspections and upheaval. Which Jake barely notices while trying to conceal keeping his new baby alive.

It's all written in a first person past voice, with lots of editorial asides from the now much older Jake. It's a very disruptive style, difficult to read. But it does very well indeed at portraying the teenage angst, without the overwhealmingly annoying emo-teen that say Rowling, manages. Obviously focused very much on the symbolic and paired growing up of the dragon and the boy, it doea lso manage to get in a bit of actual lab lit style sciencey commentary - reproducability of evidence and some thoughts on the intelligence of animals. Jake hardly ever mentions any of the other characters and so it is a very self centred book - up until the extrodinarily extended epilogue which covers a bit more of the wider context.

It is charming and well worth reading, I suspect best aimed at those in their late teens, but enjoyable for anyone. However I think a more traditional writing style may have produced a better novel, even if it sacrificed the immidiacy of the communication ( )

I'm not a huge fan of streaming consciousness. I read this book, and it seemed like the narrator was speed-talking without taking a breath the majority of the time. A teenage boy was the narrator, so perhaps the speed talking was understandable. I expected more of this book and didn't get it. While Robin did a great job channeling a teenage boy, I think the rest of the book suffered greatly in imagery, plot, and secondary and tertiary character development. ( )