Dragon Venom - Lawrence Watt-Evans Book Review

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Review Summary

Tor, Oct 2003, 25.95, 416 pp.
ISBN: 0765302799

Arlian was the only survivor of the dragon assault on his village, but during his escape he was captured and sold as a slave. Escaping, he swallowed a mix of human blood and deadly dragon venom that turned him into an almost invincible hybrid dragon-human. However, the curse of his transformation is that he constantly will turn less human until the day he dies.

Arlian wants revenge on those who killed his family and friends, harmed him and turned him into what he is today. Though Arlian has no support from his hybrid peers, he knows how and when to kill a dragon. While the dragons hibernate during the middle of winter, Arlian begins a genocide slaughtering of the beasts in their lair. However, for every action there is a reaction and in this case, new evils from the no longer checked malevolent wizards and monsters attack. Desperate to right what he has wrought Arlian experiments on animals to see whether the elixir that transformed him will create other magical beings. His hybrid comrades and the surviving dragons will kill him to stop him.

The final entry of Lawrence Watt-Evans' Dragon trilogy (see DRAGON WEATHER and DRAGON SOCIETY) is an exciting epic fantasy that works when Arlian struggles with moral dilemmas that symbolizes modern science leading readers to ponder the issue of where to draw a line. When the story line turns to action-packed sorcery skirmishes, fans of the author will take delight, but a strong entry could have been superlative if the ethics question remained front and center throughout rather than in and out.

Harriet Klausner

Harriet Klausner, Resident Scholar

Detailed literary breakdown of Dragon Venom

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Ratings are on a 1-10 scale (Low to High)
Plot

Composition of Book
Descript. of chases or violence - 10%
planning/preparing, gather info, debate puzzles/motives - 40%
Feelings, relationships, character bio/development - 30%
Descript. of society, phenomena (tech), places - 20%

Tone of book - suspenseful (sophisticated fear)
FANTASY or SCIENCE FICTION? - fantasy world/fantasy past
Adversaries are… - dragons (hostile)
Lifeform altered? Yes
Kind of alteration: - Magically turned into another being
GIANT monster(s) Yes

Main Adversary
Identity: - Male
Age: - 40's-50's
Profession/status: - mage/magician
How much of work is main antagonist actually present in: - a moderate amount
How sensitive is this character? - hard edged
Sense of humor - Mostly serious with occasional humor
Intelligence - Smarter than most other characters
Physique - very athletic

Setting
Earth setting: - during "Tolkien" (fairytime) times
Takes place on Earth? Yes

Style
Person? - mostly 3rd
Accounts of torture and death? - generic/vague references to death/punishment
How much dialogue? - significantly more dialog than descript

Most similar books to Dragon Venom
Dragon Society by Lawrence Watt-Evans
The Seadragon's Daughter by Alan F. Troop
The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien
Rhiana by Michele Hauf
The Other Wind by Ursula K. LeGuin

Note: the views expressed here are only those of the reviewer(s).

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