A Natural History of Dragons

Executive Summary: The book has surprisingly few dragons in it for being in the title of the book. It's still a decent book, but I found myself underwhelmed by the end of it.

Full Review
I was hesitant to read this book when it was announced as the December pick for Sword & Laser. I like dragons, but the concept of this book made me apprehensive.

I ended up really enjoying the start of this book though. It really appealed to my inner scientist that wants to categorize things and understand how they work.

The main character of Lady Trent is well written. You can tell the difference of her as a girl/young woman and the elderly “I don't give a damn” renowned scholar. The humor while not abundant was pretty good.

I'm not sure if I was expecting a series of stories about her time as a dragon naturalist exactly, but I wasn't expecting so much of her time courting her husband and her early life struggling with her interests in Natural History and science in a society where it's not proper for woman to do so.

I expected a lot more dragons stuff. Even if it was time spent analzing and discovering things about dragons. There was certainly some of that, but it was more of a backdrop to the story of Lady Trent's early life.

This feels like the first book in a series, and maybe later stories will include a lot more about her life as a Dragon Naturalist. This just felt like too much setup for me.

It ends in a decent enough place and is well written, but it just wasn't really for me. At this point I don't plan on continuing the series (if it does indeed turn into one), but I imagine people who really enjoy Lady Trent, might thoroughly enjoy this book.