The Dragon’s Boy by Jane Yolen
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
THE DRAGON’S BOY is a sweet, short retelling of the King Arthur mythos. It’s similar to the Disney movie “The Sword In the Stone” but it reshapes things like Merlin and that sword in subtly different ways. For such a short book, there’s quite a large twist at the end, but it’s an interesting one. Sick of being bullied by the older boys at Sir Ector’s small castle, Artos is happy to find a dragon who offers him wisdom in exchange for pots of gravy with meat. Artos complies, and learns, but soon is able to take his place with the other boys and ignores the dragon and its wisdom for a while. Of course, Artos eventually wants the dragon’s help, but what he finds there is not what he expects. This is a short story, so we don’t see how Artos incorporates his hard-earned lessons, but they are good ones, presented in novel ways. If you are a fan of King Arthur mythology, you’ll enjoy this quick reimagining of how he gained the wisdom to become great.
Received as a free digital ARC via Netgalley and the publisher.