The Arrival of the Dragons

Dragon’s Reign, Book 4

By: X. Aratare

Narrated by: Edward Fox, X. Aratare

As the other Dragon Kings and Queens arrive to court Caden, tempers flare and other hijinks ensue! From the Green Dragon King Illarion buzzing Reach to the Red Dragon Queen Mei bringing an army of robots with her as a gift, nothing is easy for Valerius or Caden. But while the Dragons are distracted by their internal strife, their enemies are still moving swiftly against them.

NOTE: This is a long serial that is divided into book-length segments. Every single one ends in a cliffhanger. We anticipate there being 9 volumes.

©2019 Catherine N Tetzlaff (P)2024 Catherine N Tetzlaff

4.5 for book 1-5

Amazon doesn't allow for partial stars and someone was kind of a jerk in a 1 star review I read so I rounded up.

this story does a good job at world and character building. I'm compactly giving books 1-5 this review because the books roll from one to the next seemlessly with no time gap. In fact I believe the timeframe from book 1 to book 5 is less than 2 weeks.

The story is non-stop, and while they put a high priority on politics and nonviolent resolution, I find it interesting, especially considering every other shift book I've read has been high drama and testosterone. I like how this series forces the readers into a very realistic modern day version of what it would look like for shifters to be in the world.

As of right now, my only complaint is that at the beginning of the series we were made to expect that all dragon shifters were all angry and territorial and like the black dragon... by book 5 you see a bit of a shift in that narrative...and I wish if x aratare wanted her dragons to have their particular personalities then she would have put less of a doom and gloom perspective on the dragons from the beginning. It's a bit jarring when you finally meet them from the expectations set in the beginning.

Anywho, I fully intend to download book 6 onto my kindle and start it tonight since it's not in audible. I fully intend to finish the 9 book series to see how they eventually resolve the middle class shrinkage issue. I have my own ideas of how I'd resolve it so I'm definitely excited to see how this progresses.

My Honest Review

This review is mainly for the whole series. This series is not written well. Characters are spiraling and they don't grow as people. We never really get to know Characters either. I kept listening to the books because I was hoping they would improve however that is nor the case. I just seem to get more annoyed the more the stories progress. There is barely any action in the books. everything must be solved peacefully. that is the way of the white dragon, however conflict makes stories interesting. when everything conflict is tamped down, we dont get any action. Nothing happens in the fist 5 books. This inaction also happens when the dragons interact with humans. they have no fear so why should they do anything. All the conflicts are avoided. The only realy "threat" is the other dragons which dont come into play until book 4. You might as well start book 1 then skip to 4. Since nothing happens that is significant. Also the characters are very annoying the narrator doesn't give them life. He makes everyone sound whiny. It is very annoying. I know i keep rattling on but also these books seem very political. I know in the story politics plays a role but really it doesn't need to. The book feels political with a hint of fantasy. These dont feel like fantasy books. I think this has to do with the modern day setting. The story is just mugged down. The setting should have been medieval or anything else. The aspect of the phones and press take away from the atmosphere.Again it takes away conflict. With phones and the internet, everything is known immediately. I wish we could see more things get flushed out instead of immediately with not hint of any emotion.This is my honest review. If you like books with plot and good characters I would avoid these. X aratare does write good book like the Merman Series. However this really falls short.