niseag's reviews
290 reviews

 Dragon Vet poses an unique perspective and take on the fantasy genre. Devoid of staples like battle and conquest, it focusses instead on problemsolving with the aim of helping. It is a breath of fresh air that I very much enjoyhed reading, but I still felt like there are points that could be improved. This is a pretty long book, around 400 pages on my ereader, which feels like too much for what is actually happening: The book lacks a strong central narrative to keep you reading and pull the reader along. Instead the book is devided up in these bite size chunks of story that only vaguely overlap, and while the call backs can be very exciting (expecially in the scene with the hydra!), it is making me wonder if this concept would not be better explored in a series of novellas. 

I also want to talk about the characters, most of them are interesting people: I liked how everyone had their own unique backstory and motivation, influencing their personality and actions, but there are some things I think have been handled with little tact. Predominantly with the depiction of different cultural backgrounds felt either offhanded or very on the nose. Thinking of Edith's nomadic background which presumably being a large cultural influence in her life, yet being only briefly discussed. This felt like a missed opportunity to properly represent a different form of peoples. Ellie spoke in Scots the entire book, a trait that got weary pretty quickly and I think could have been handed with more nuance, but we still learnt near nothing of where she was from. Presumably not Scotland, as I doubt that's an existing place in this fictional world. Equally, Madam Sophia's foreign name being made into a point of humour with no elaboration as to her background left me with an uncomfortable feeling. 

I feel that, like the title character, the author might be better with animals than he is with people. All the creatures were written with great care and the science put behind them was intriguing. This is what the book rests on, and as stated before it forms a unique vantage point and a strong foundation. All in all, I very much enjoyed reading this, and I think other people that read a lot of fantasy might get a kick out of it as well. 

This might be the first ARC I will be giving 5 stars, but... It's worth it for sure. I went into this book ready to rip it to shreds, on the hunt for anachronisms and historical malady but... I stopped making notes quite soon as I was simply swept away. This book is best approached as a short story collection, but each of its parts is intriguing and tense and near impossible to put down. It's themes felt almost tailor made to the things I enjoy, too, further taking away my will to scrutinise. From mad scientists to werewolves, the Loch Ness monster and the Isles: Each of them written with a clear love for the country and its history. It was exciting! 

That is to say it was not without its flaws... The English centric narrative occasionally grinded my gears, which were grinded even worse by the mention of ogham being "ancient druidic". And I wished that the narrative would play with local folklore just a bit more. I would have liked seeing the Celtic benevolent werewolves, or the boobrie bird, etc. 

But. It cannot take away from my overall enjoyment. The writing style reminded me of HG Wells or Verne, seemingly taking inspiration from victorian writing at large, but with a more modern pacing that keeps it exciting. The plots hit hard and the descriptions, gruesome as they sometimes were, where incredibly lively. Splendid! 

Thanks netgalley for the ARC

Thank you Reedsy for the ARC. see my origional review here https://reedsy.com/discovery/book/the...

I was thrilled for this book based on its synopsis: Orcs and Dragons and Adventure bode for an amazing story ready to unfold. And I cannot fault it: a great story did unfold! Before I speak of the bits I adored, however, there is an elephant in the room: This is a Dungeons and Dragons adventure. It might be something people less familiar with DnD would overlook, but for someone that plays weekly themselves certain things become painfully obvious. By those things I mean the description of the use of Ki, or spell slots, or something that looked a lot like the warcaster feat... Many characters also seemed to have very clearly defined and recognisable classes and races, doing things that fit those as by game rules. I will not be convinced that Panthor are not copyright-free tabaxi, for example. This needs to be mentionned as I feel like it stiffened the world and worldbuilding. This story kept making me wish for just that bit more inventiveness, yet it continued to feel like something I had seen before. I spend this entire book waiting and hoping for it to break the mold, but it never truly did. This has another side too, however, as it made the book feel very familiar: which is not necessarily a bad thing. I was happy to lift onto the familiar ride, similar to how someone might watch a streamed campaign and there is something to say for a book to follow the same idea. It would be a great read for people that enjoy that kind of thing!

Another thing that I think might stem from the roleplay aspect of this story, is that character arcs were slightly stunted by constant flipping between characters: Every time something important happened, a cutaway made it really hard to get a real overview of what was going on the resolve the arisen issues. which was a shame, because I was really invested! Coming to the good part of this review: I genuinely cared for these characters and their quests. Zom's arch was my personal favourite, leaving me excited to come back to his POV but I can see that there was something for many tastes. The character's archs carried this book for me. I cared more for those than the epic battles and dragon riding and whatever...I wanted to know what happened to these people I was introduced to and I think that is commendable. 

 

I am not sure how I feel about the setup on this one. It sets of Torak and Renn as a couple which I am sure a lot of people would expect, but I have no memories of from the other books and comes across as rather jarring. I imagine Paver has tried to age up the characters to a more mature standard, as this book came out a good few years after the rest of the series, but I just feel like we missed a lot of these beloved peoples lives in the time that was skipped. I was also not a fan of the use of jealousy as  character conflict. I don't like this as a character trait on the main character, I'm all for character flaws, don't get me wrong, but this particular one just grinds my gears. It reflects a possessive characteristic that I felt did not fit the usually more rational Torak.

But it was great to come back to this world! it was nice to see how Paver makes the world varied, with each clan having it's own customs that fit with their environment and the lifestyle they might have to lead. that said, the narwal clan was definitely a jarring experience. It was well established that Torak's experience was a lot different from Renn's, which was interesting, and I would definitely like to have seen that explored. Though, then again this is a children's book, so perhaps this was just enough.

The twist does make this book, I think. It really spurred it into gear, flips expectations and, to me, reminded me why I loved this series as a child. I have one question though, and without spoiling too much.... Did Torak not kill his bone-kin in the end? how does that work?

Regardless, delighted to see this series not dead and worth the read. 

just...YIKES. zo praat je niet over mensen, en laat alsjeblieft die vierde muur heel. en daar bovenop is het "hello fellow kids" gehalte super hoog.

"How to be a Trans Man" was an odd read for me, bouncing between painfully relatable, to beyond my scope of understanding. I am, of course, nonbinary rather than a man, which could have caused this dichotimy, but I think part of it is also that the lives of influencers tend to feel less relatable to average people. I do like that the people represented in this book are from all kinds of different backgrounds and stances, giving various perspectives which are quite interesting.
The interview style writing feels clunky, but works well for the purposes of this book. All in all a solid read that I would recommend to not just transmasculine people, but also cis queer guys looking at their own masculinity. 

Maybe I am too demisexual for this book. I really wanted to like it, and adored the characters and setting and how it all played together. Actual historic research seems to have gone into this and I love that, edinburgh felt alive and real I could imagine its hills and streets stretching out in this novel, familiar but yet different. Very good indeed.
Lindsay was an interesting character, I liked seeing his duality and his pretence to the outer world, and I liked seeing his bonds and approaches with the people around him. I also liked Drew, the stoic silent type can be done quite appealingly: still waters run deep, after all. However, when it came to their interaction, lust on first sight is such a strange concept to me. It does not feel real. I have been told by friends of different sexualities that this actually happens, but this is a personal review after all... this continues with Drews constant hesitation to be intimate, which made me feel rather uncomfortable through most of the sexual encounters. That said, thank you so much for making sure that consent was never in a position to be questioned. This is something many romance books just skip over and I am so glad that this situation is clarified by the characters. Had this not happened, that would probably have been a dealbreaker for me reading the relationship that is sketched out.
I also want to mention that the depiction of a deep platonic bond with one of the side character's relationship was such a wonderful surprise! The idea that a "mate" can be nonsexual/nonromantic is great and something I think is important to be highlighted.

Then...the ending. This was not what I was expecting, and I am not happy with the turn it took. It feels like it largely undoes the story I had been reading up till this point and it was really unsatisfying. It has put me off of wanting to read the next book, because I am none too pleased with the dynamic shift that was suggested in this ending.

 I love Gaelic poetry, and I am very thankful for this book for introducing me to Alasdair mac Mhaighstir Alasdair who quickly became one of my favourite poets. But I must address something: These translations make no sense! It is as if the author did not expect anyone to be able to read the origional poems and just provided a different poem for a translation, leaving only the central message but leaving out any nuances. This quite frankly ruined the experience.