Requested the third book in the Dragonvarld Trilogy by mistake. There was enough information on the back of the case for the Audio Renaissance edition that I figured I could follow it, but I didn't care enough about any of the characters to get past the first CD. Ms. Toren's voice for Evelina (and the character's personality) was the biggest reason I decided not to bother. ( )

ORIGINALLY POSTED AT Fantasy Literature.

2.5 stars
Master of Dragons, the final book in Margaret Weis's Dragonvarld trilogy was a tasty but sloppy finale -- like a cheesecake that didn't quite set.

This last book wraps things up, as we knew it would, and everything is finally well in the world, as we knew it would be. There are some fine moments (Draconas showing tenderness to a female dragon, Ven finds a family, Marcus falls in love) and even some hilarious ones (Draconas darning socks, Evelina's ironic fate). Characterization, especially of the bad guys, continues to be a high point, and the writing is nothing brilliant, but certainly pleasant enough.

But this otherwise entertaining novel suffers from internal inconsistencies:

* On page 38, Draconas is said to wear "the guise of a human male in his thirties," and 5 pages later he is described as "a human male of undetermined years."

* Draconas has cast the illusion that he is a little girl while staying in DragonKeep. He is able to eavesdrop on adults because of his keen dragon hearing. But, later, we are told that as a little girl "his hearing was so reduced that it seemed his ears were stuffed with wax."

* Much of what Anora (Prime Minister of the dragon parliament) says to the parliament is illogical and none of the dragons ever notice. For example, she says she should have removed Draconas from his post as "walker" because he was starting to become emotionally involved with humans, but she didn't remove him because he was the best walker they'd ever had because he was able to stay detached from humans. Then she says that she became involved in Maristara and Grald's plot 200 years ago because humans had become such a threat (she cites their canons), but a few lines later she says that because their plot went awry, the humans created canons (a few years ago). Sometimes she indicates that the canons are a threat which, though they are no threat, show that humans are, for the first time in their history, preparing to fight dragons.

There also seem to be inconsistencies about dragon magic vs dragon blood, who can see through illusions and who can't, and to what extent thoughts can be shielded from others with dragon magic. These sorts of "rules" seem to be conveniently flexible. For example, one of the monks is able to see through illusions, yet he doesn't recognize Draconas?

Then there are the unbelievable elements. For example, Anora's betrayal just doesn't ring true -- it sounds like a forced plot twist. And, Anora says that to keep their plot secret from Draconas, they had to kill some good dragons (which she seems to regret) when, if they had just killed Draconas instead, everything would have been fine. And it didn't make sense to keep the plot from the dragon parliament if the purpose of it was to protect the dragons from the might-someday-be-threatening humans. It would have made immensely more sense, and been a lot less stressful, to just go to the parliament and say "hey, these humans want to kill us -- let's kill them first." That seems a lot easier and a lot more likely to be successful than to embark on a 200 year breeding program in order to try to figure out if they might someday rule the humans with half-human, half-dragon creatures and a pack of mad monks. (And let's not forget that the humans weren't even starting to threaten the dragons until AFTER the breeding program started.) (And let's not forget that Anora even says herself that the humans are not actually threatening yet -- they just might be in the future.) The whole thing just seems sloppy. Half-baked.

I listened to this on audiobook. The reader, a woman, did a great job with the female voices. At first I thought she was doing a great job with the male voices too, because her voice for Grald, the first male speaker, was excellent -- really slimy. Unfortunately, she used the same slimy voice for every male character in the entire book.

My overall opinion of this series: Unless you've just got a thing for dragons, I'd recommend choosing something better.
Read more Margaret Weis book reviews at Fantasy Literature ( )

This is the third book in Weis's Dragonvarld Trilogy. I actually bought it the week it was released, back in 2005, because I loved the first two books... but as tends to happen with many books I buy (especially ones that were purchased while I was still in university), I wasn't able to read it at the time and then forgot about it.

I grabbed it off the shelf a few days ago, after getting the urge to find closure on this series after... uh, eight years. In the end, I'm glad I read it, but I'm even more glad I didn't read it when I first got the book. I think if I'd read it on release, I would have been incredibly disappointed by it -- this way, I had eight years of hoping and wondering and anticipating a great ending, and of course by now my excitement has lessened and the let-down isn't as painful.

It's a decent fantasy story, yes... but that's it. I was disappointed to find the ending full of standard tropes, wooden dialogue, and contrived dream sequences that lacked the magic and horrific wonders of the first two books in series. Weis had surprised me in a number of ways in those first two books, with twists I hadn't anticipated and fascinating characters doing horrible things (or wonderful things), and her worldbuilding had me captivated.

In this book, we're out of the setting from the previous books, which may be why it feels a little wooden. There's also an annoying female character whose sub-plot story, in the end, only ties into the main story in one important way (and it feels sudden and random), and left me wondering why her role couldn't have been filled by someone else, leaving her out entirely.

Giving Weis the benefit of the doubt -- she is quite the accomplished writer, after all -- I wonder if she just didn't know how to end things here, or if she was on a deadline that crunched her imaginative efforts. She's published nothing else in this world since (ending it at just the three books), despite having built something interesting that could have provided additional material. Maybe the series didn't do as well as the publisher had hoped. Hard to say.

In the end, it's too bad it came to a disappointing end, but I got my enjoyment from the first two books in the trilogy and at least I now have closure. *shrug* ( )

I read book one of the series, but skipped book two. This is book three. I don't feel like I missed anything by skipping book two. This book has lots of action, a little romance and a satisfying conclusion. ( )

Here finishes the Dragonvarld trilogy. This was really just an average finish to an average series. Nothing special here, nothing to come back to. I think there was some opening left for future novels in this world, but I'm not sure I'd really care one way or the other. I've read worse fantasy, but I've definitely read better. If you've got time to spare or are just a huge Weis fan, then by all means read this trilogy, otherwise, your time may be spent better elsewhere. ( )