A 2015 Morris Award Finalist
In a world where dragons feed off of carbon emissons and attacks are a daily occurrence, the small town of Trondheim finds themselves thanking their lucky stars when the famed Lottie Thorskard decides to move her family there after recovering from a horrific accident while slaying. It's her hope that with brother Aodhan slaying dragons in the region and Aodhan's son, the titular Owen, in training, more dragon slayers will consider serving the good as opposed to going to where the money is. And that's where Siobhan comes in. After a chance meeting with Owen on the first day of school, she becomes his tutor, and, more importantly, his bard. Tasked with creating a public narrative for his exploits, she's a mix between a modern-day PR rep and an epic storyteller of old. A musician and composer, she's perfectly suited to crafting tales that gloss over the not-so-great moments of dragon slaying and paint Owen as a confident, dragon-slayer-in-training who is bound to become as great as his famed aunt.
I'm not going to lie, I wasn't sure if I was going to like this one. It wasn't the dragon aspect, because I do like dragon stories, but the brief description I read prior to checking this book out didn't have me excited. But once I got into it and realized that this was an alternate version of our world, I found myself really excited by the premise. It helps that Siobhan is smart, knowledgeable about dragon history in general, which allows her to think outside of the box when confronted with problems. Throughout the book, there are brief, infodump-y chapters that help explain some of the history of dragon slaying, and it's here that E.K. Johnston's training as an archaeologist really shines through. You can tell that a lot of thought was put into how dragons would affect things like politics, the military, and economics, especially once Henry Ford starts manufacturing cars. All in all, this is a great story with an interesting premise, and I'm glad to see there's a sequel in the works.
(Read as part of YALSA's Morris/Nonfiction Challenge.)
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