Dragons of Spring Dawning

Dragons of Spring Dawning is the third and final book in Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman’s Dragonlance: Chronicles, as well as the third book in the huge multi-author Dragonlance Universe. It picks up where the second book left off. Tanis loves Kitiara, but he cannot in good conscience take her offer to join her DragonArmy. Instead he chooses to leave her and return to his companions, after which they board a ship, hoping to eventually reunite with the others from whom they were separated at the beginning of book #2. Unfortunately they’re caught in a storm and end up shipwrecked in the underwater kingdom of the sea elves. Before that happens, though, Raistlin uses the Dragon Orb to spirit himself away. Meanwhile, Laurana, Flint, and show more Tasslehoff are still grieving the loss of their good friend Sturm at the battle of the High Clerist’s Tower. Everyone looks to Laurana for leadership, and after the return of her brother, Gilthanis, who arrives with the good dragons, she takes up the mantle of the Golden General, leading her troops to many victories over the Dark Queen’s DragonArmies. Just as they seem to have gotten the upper hand, a message arrives from Kitiara who claims that Tanis is with her, that he’s dying and his final wish is to see Laurana again. Even knowing that it may be a trap, Laurana’s love for Tanis won’t allow her to ignore the summons on the off chance that it is real, so using a captured Dragon Lord to guide her, she heads for the Dark Queen’s realm, but is captured along the way. After the sea elves help Tanis and the others get back to dry land, they finally reunite with Flint and Tasslehoff, and learning of what happened to Laurana, Tanis and most of his companions embark on a final mission, trying to save her.

As with the first two books, we have an ensemble cast of main characters. Our principles include Tanis, a half-elf, half-human, who has been the defacto leader of the companions. He stepped back from that role somewhat in the second book, but here, he steps up again, when he decides that he cannot in good conscience follow Kitiara no matter how much he might love her. So he leads everyone as they board the ship to escape the DragonArmies and later in the quest to rescue Laurana. The mage Raistlin is with the companions until the ship founders. Then he escapes on his own using the Dragon Orb and ends up on the steps of a library in Palanthus at death’s door. We don’t see him again until the end, where he plays a pivotal role. His twin brother, Caramon, is still the brave warrior, loyally sticking by everyone throughout. Even though he feels betrayed by Raistlin, he still loves his brother very much. He also loves Tika, the barmaid from Solace, who has become a pretty good warrior in her own right, but he doesn’t feel like he can make a commitment to her with his responsibilities to Raistlin hanging over his head. There’s also the gruff dwarf, Flint, and the kender, Tasslehoff, who are the best of friends even though Flint always says that Tas drives him crazy. These two often provide some fun comic relief. Riverwind and Goldmoon are there during the first half of the book, but after they make it back to Kalaman, Tanis insists that they stay behind and not accompany the rest of them on their final mission. Raistlin and Caramon’s sister, Kitiara is essentially one of the bad guys, having joined the Dark Queen and become the Dark Lady, one of the feared Dragon Highlords. She tried to use Tanis’s love for her to manipulate him into joining her, but when he leaves, she goes after him and twists his arm by tricking Laurana and taking her hostage. There are also plenty of other supporting characters who play smaller roles.

Out of the three books in the Dragonlance: Chronicles trilogy, Dragons of Spring Dawning ended up being my favorite. There were less slow spots in the pacing and quite a bit more action. I also didn’t have as much trouble keeping track of everyone since I’d already become very familiar with the core characters and there were few new ones being introduced. There was also some pretty good character development in this installment. I like that even the good guys like Tanis and Laurana sometimes have flaws. Love proves to be something of a weakness for both of them, given that Tanis allowed Kitiara to temporarily turn his head and Laurana went after Tanis out of love even though she knew it might be a trap. But love also proves to be a strength, in that Tanis’s realized love for Laurana gives him the will to get out of a sticky situation and he is also willing to give up his life for her in the end. Kitiara may be a bad guy, but her assertions that she doesn’t love Tanis beyond him being a means to an end are belied by a couple of her actions. Likewise Raistlin has always been a rather selfish character and the things he does in this book show that he would betray even those he cares for to gain power. However, he’s not so thoroughly corrupted as to completely ignore his friends, even though arguably he might have if it hadn’t benefited him as well. So I liked that some of the characters are more complicated and not pure good or evil. Unfortunately we do say another sad farewell to one of the main characters. Dragons of Spring Dawning has a very suspenseful denouement with our companions venturing into the dragon’s lair, in an effort to save Laurana, and the ending provides a satisfactory wrap-up to the events that began months earlier in the first book. That said, though, it leaves just enough tantalizing loose threads to encourage the reader to continue with the Dragonlance: Legends, the next sub-series in the greater Dragonlance universe, which will feature Raistlin and Caramon. Since I do like Caramon and find Raistlin’s mercurial nature intriguing, I’m definitely interested in reading those soon. show less

Le habría puesto cuatro estrellas si Raistlin no se hubiera pasado el 50% del libro en paradero desconocido, porque cuando por fin vuelve a aparecer es como el segundo advenimiento de Cristo XD sus partes son muy épicas, pero las de los demás son, en general, aburridas.
Never forget los elfos sirenos delfines exhibicionistas polimorfos. Se les fue la olla pero bien a esas alturas, no le puedo poner cuatro estrellas a un libro que tiene ESO.
Raistlin salva este libro, para mí. Seguido muy de cerca por Fizban y Tas. Pero ya.

Although this is a reread, I was quite surprised to find that I find this book, the weakest of the trilogy. Whilst there is the trademark, tropes of humour, romance, action, and intrigue, it doesn’t seem quite as cataclysmic an ending as one would’ve expected from such a brilliant trilogy up until that point. Without giving any spoilers obviously there is more grief and loss for some of the companions. I realise that when this was written there was already a movement towards the next trilogy and certainly that is mentioned in this don’t get me wrong. This is a very enjoyable and thrilling end to the Chronicles Could’ve been done better? Probably is the answer to that. I am now looking forward to moving on to the twins trilogy.

The finale of the classic fantasy trilogy is just as good as the rest of the books. Raistlin is still plotting, Caramon is still conflicted, Tanis and Laurana have to resolve whatever it is going on between them, but it all comes together very well. Not sophisticated by today's standards, but still classic epic fantasy.

I've compared this series to Lord of the Rings, but the third volume certainly charts its own course, taking the characters on journeys that seem the logical conclusions for their personalities. I rather like the way this book is structured and written, except for the character of Tanis Half-Elven, who becomes so annoying in this novel; it's not his choices that bother me, so much as his vacillating and whining.

This was the third book in this series and clearly, it's going to continue. This was the best of the three books. There was a lot of action which the authors do rather well. But the characters are still mostly flat. The literal Deus Ex Machine is contrived and I feel cheated. I saw it coming in the second book and found it lame.

There was a lot of lame storytelling. Jumping from one group of characters to another, leaving one group in peril, and then not really fleshing out how they got out of it, or if they did, it was a last-minute rescue that was again lame.

I was really disappointed in these books and only continued reading them because I owned all three and more than one friend told me how good they were. But these friends read them show more back when they came out. Had I read these back in the '80s I might have had the same opinion, but I'm a seasoned reader (and editor/proofreader) now and I can easily see behind the curtain. The literary tricks used, were just that, tricks. And done poorly at that.

If you love D&D (which I do), you might enjoy them. I didn't. I'm told the Forgotten Realms series is much better.

My recommendation would be to skip these and read Fritz Lieber's Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser instead. show less

The final book in the Chronicles Trilogy. The epic battle of gods, dragons, and the humans whose choices will decide the outcome and fate of all. The characters will make their final choices of good or bad...each with their own personal reasons driving them. Some will suprise us, while others seem inevitable. We lose some friends, gain others, and are suprised by the identities of a few.

I cried, I laughed, and even though I knew the outcome from past readings, I held my breath and prayed the good guys would win.

After finishing this book, I remembered why it is one of my all time favorite series. There have been more stories written in this world, I plan on rereading those as well.

5/5