How to Train Your Dragon

Az eleje traumatikus volt - teljesen paff voltam, hogy gyakorlatilag semmi nem úgy van, ahogy azt az általam amúgy felettébb nagyra becsült film alapján vártam. Fogatlan például nem nemes ragadozó, hanem egy nyüzüge szárnyas gyík (és TÉNYLEG fogatlan), a vikingek pedig VALÓBAN bunkók, nem csak a természet faragatlan, de jóravaló gyermekei. (Mondjuk ez valószínűleg közelebb is áll a történelmi realitásokhoz.) De így a második kötet végére eljutottam oda, hogy megveszek ezért a sorozatért, a humoráért, az mondanivalójáért, a jószívűségéért - meglehet, még egy picit jobban is, mint a gyerekek.

Az egész kötet lényegében egy mondatban összefoglalható: hülyék között kész kín egyedül show more okosnak lenni. Hablaty olyan, mint a törzs többi tagjának negatívja: amiből nekik sok van (izom), abból neki kevés, de ami belőlük totálisan hiányzik (ész), az neki fölösen is van. Ami már csak azért is szívás, mert elméletileg ő a törzs leendő vezére - de hát hogy vezethetné az ostobákat valaki, aki nem olyan ostoba, mint ők? A magyar politikai vademecum erre azt irányozza elő, hogy tettesd olyan hülyének magad, mint néped átlaga (vagy kicsit még hülyébbnek), de Hablaty nem ilyen. És pont ettől szép ez a könyv. Mert azt üzeni, hogy légy önmagad. Ne hagyd, hogy a világ betuszkoljon a maga kockájába. Ne legyél hülye viking, még ha mindenki ezt is várja tőled. Legyél inkább okos viking - és idővel hátha te formálod majd a környezetedet, nem pedig az téged.

Ja, sárkányok is vannak benne. Meg kardozás. Kaland. show less

Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III is a skinny kid and not really expected to live up to his father Stoick the Vast's reputation as Viking chief of the Hooligan tribe, let alone his long name. From the very first page when he and his fellow initiates are sent into a dragon cave to get their dragons, you know that shenanigans will abound; what you don't know is exactly how hard Hiccup will have to work to become a Hero.

On the recommendation of several fellow LTers, I listened to the audio of this kid's story read by David Tennant. His hilarious narration was worth it, and I enjoyed every over-the-top and ridiculous adventure Hiccup and Toothless, and their friends and enemies. It's definitely a kid's story, lots of jokes that are the show more equivalent of fart jokes (even just the names of the characters are meant to get a laugh), and very different from the movie but every bit as enjoyable. I'm still puzzling over how Hiccup can be "the third" when his father's name is Stoick, but you know... whatever. Recommended. show less

Welcome to a world of dragons....

I absolutely loved the movie series How to Train Your Dragon. It blew my mind that it was based off a book, and ever since I had been chasing down a copy. It's been years of me trying to find it at local bookstores (because why just find it online? The hunt is way more fun), but I finally came across it. Not through a store, but through a friend! A friend of mine grew up reading and binging this series, and when I happened to mention it was one I was looking for - BAM! I borrowed the book. It's funny how things turn out, eh?

This book is the first in the series of How To Train Your Dragon. It follows Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III (we just call him Hiccup), and his journey to become a Viking. There's a show more special ritual the men of the tribe have to go through. They collect a dragon and train it. Once they've trained their dragon and completed special quests, voila! Viking! Hiccup is a little awkward turtle though. He ends up picking the smallest dragon, who most people are sure is the most wildly available (and kind of bland) dragon, but Toothless ends up being anything but. Small but mighty!

Hiccup and the band of misfits all end up totally blowing their chances at becoming Vikings... Until, by chance, a giant problem arises. Mean, evil dragons are there to destroy their crew! Well, this sounds like a time to call a bunch of hooligan Viking-wannabes and their barely trained dragons, right? It might not be the most sound of logic, but they take a chance anyways!

This book is an absolute delight. If you're like me, you watched the movie first and then were oddly surprised when the book was NOTHING like the movie. They are vastly different, but still both excellent in their own right. You can tell that the movie took inspiration from the book but didn't follow it 100%. I like that! It makes both of them their own separate entities. I honestly can't wait to grab more books in the series. This book was an absolute delight.

I definitely recommend middle graders picking this book up. It's fun, fast paced, has pictures and will take you away to a fantasy land. It's goofy, silly and just a delight to read. I highly recommend it! Why, you might ask? Well, Hiccup is a lovable character with great ethics and goals. He does his best, isn't perfect but still comes off as likeable and very real. He's not whiny, or bratty, or anything annoying (like some other middle grade books). He wants to do his best and really tries to help everyone out. He loves his family, his dragon and his friends (even if some are super annoying). Then you have Toothless - he's quite the little dragon who packs a very sassy punch. He's a fun character who has a great character arc. Once you get past your main characters, you have a wealth of dragons and fun quirks about each of them. You can learn about the many fictional characters and be amazed by how much Cressida Cowell has put into them. Plus the humour in this book is awesome. It's not all fart jokes - it holds up whether you are a kid or an adult. It put a big smile on my face.

Four out of five stars! show less

Very entertaining, but I was bewildered by the lack of female characters. Valhallarama is basically viking Smurfette. I was surprised to discover that the movie adaptation (also entertaining, but only tenuously related to the book), which only BARELY passed the Bechdel Test, passed with made-up girl characters.

Call me crazy, but really, what kind of message does this send to young readers? Not that girls are yucky or somehow less-than, but that they simply do not exist. I don't know what to think about this.

I loved this! It is a simple, easy to read children's book, but it's engaging, clever and funny. The hero needs to train a dragon to be part of his Viking tribe, but while his peers yell at their dragons until they do as they are told, he finds himself having to talk to his (very small and unusual) dragon more persuasively. (There is a lovely gentle analogy of parenting choices which will raise wry smiles from adult readers.) But when Great Peril appears, will Hiccup be the one who saves the day?

Hiccup Horrendous Haddock, the famous Dragon-whisperer of lore, had to learn about dragons somehow - and this book chronicles his growing pains. He and a team of similarly-aged kids must capture and train baby dragons in order to be accepted into their Viking clans as adults. They face expulsion if they fail! But Hiccup's dragon simply isn't cooperating. First of all, it's tiny and toothless - which is humiliating for the dragon of the son of the Chief. Second, it has an attitude problem: it refuses to be trained. It looks like Hiccup might be expelled from his Viking clan! But then some sea-dragons emerge from the depths of the ocean - and only Hiccup (well, with help from his dragon and his friends) can save his people.

This was a show more hilarious book. My nephew, who isn't a fan of reading, just gobbled this one up. He even sounds excited to read the next one. :) There are funny pictures drawn throughout the story, and the narration itself is laugh-out-loud funny it a childish way. I really enjoyed this book.

I also loved the 2010 movie which was VERY loosely based on the book. The basic setting was the same - a Viking boy named Hiccup must save his clan from destruction at the teeth of hungry dragons - but that's about all that's the same. In the movie, dragons are creatures to be hunted. They aren't kept as pets. Both the book and the movie are very cute and very funny. But in order to enjoy both, you need to be the type of person who is willing to accept that just because the plot is different, doesn't mean the story is bad. (This is difficult for many people to admit!) show less

This was so much fun to listen to! Think Hagar the Horrible meets Harry Potter and you get the gest of this first book in Cowell's delightful children's book series. Read by the incomparable David Tennant, I pretty much laughed, chuckled and snorted my way through this one. Who knew Vikings and Dragons would make such a comic team! Hiccup - son of the tribe's Viking chief - makes a wonderful child hero, along with his band of friends and terrorizers. Toothless, Hiccup's dragon, is quite the show stealer of this story, along with Hiccup's granddad, Wrinkles. Cowell has a wonderful imagination and a gift for humour. The serious adult reader that I am cannot wait to start listening to the next book in the series!