Dragon Hero

Riders of Fire, Book Two - A Dragons' Realm Novel

By: Eileen Mueller

Narrated by: Caitlin Davies

Tomaaz doesn’t believe in dragons, until the dragon queen abducts his twin sister, Ezaara. When she goes missing, his parents reveal dangerous family secrets. That night, his father is wrongly imprisoned while his mother heads deep into Death Valley to atone for a dreadful crime.

To make things worse, an army of bestial tharuks attacks his village. No one is prepared. Torn, Tomaaz doesn’t know whom to save. Should he rescue Pa from prison, help the villagers, or follow Ma into enemy territory? Or should he save Lovina, the abused daughter of a traveling merchant?

Tomaaz has to act fast, because Commander Zens and his clone armies are marching through Dragon’s Realm.

Fans of Anne McCaffrey’s Dragon Riders of Pern and Christopher Paolini’s The Inheritance Cycle will love Riders of Fire.

©2018 Eileen Mueller (P)2019 Audible Australia Pty Ltd.

Ended to soon

A lot happened to the people in Ezaara's life during her start at the hold. This was wonderfully told and written. I can't wait for more.

This narrator was born to do Dragon Books!

Another great book in the series! I mean, dragon riders? What's not to love!
So, this adventure takes place around the same time as book 1, except instead of following Ezaara, it follows her brother in the events he faces while she's off on her own adventure. It eventually connects and has them both on the same timeline. But the world building, and characters are brilliant in this series. I loved the story line, the personalities, and the dragons of this world! I am definitely now a fan of the author, and as always, the narrator did a fantastic job! How could she not? She also did the Dragon Blood series. I can't wait to check out the rest of this series!

Even better than the first, and I loved that one

I really enjoyed the first book in the series, Ezaara. My only complaint there was that it started just too darn quickly. Things that other authors would spread out over multiple chapters just seemed to happen over the course of a few paragraphs. This second book, Dragon Hero, fills in some of the gaps, but not all of them. This makes this book even more satisfying. I think it would be possible to start with book 2, but I am not sure. There will definitely be a few spoilers if you go that way, but not too many. If anyone reads or listens in that order, I would love to hear what they think. It really feels like the two books were meant to be read at the same time, like they were written together, but turned out to be so big that the author had to go through the painful process of splitting them apart. I sent an email to the author about this (I love that you can communicate with authors before they are famous, and they write back). She said that was basically the case...started as one story that got too big. Personally, I would love to hear the story as it was originally envisioned. I have now joined her fan club so I can read more of the back story and learn about her other books...I enjoyed everything that much.

The events of the two books take place essentially simultaneously, but from the perspective of different characters. Neither story quite stands on its own, but together the combination is great. Now I want even more.

The narration fit in well with the story, although the bad guys don't quite sound like I imagined...I don't know why I expect the bad guys to have more of a deep male voice, but maybe that is just my imagination being a little sexist. But the reading was top notch..

I was given a free copy of this book at my request (After Ezaara, I begged for a chance to listen to and review Dragon Hero) in exchange for a fair review. Now I will be asking for a chance to review all of the future books as well.

More, and better, than the first book!

It's not all that often that you see a second in series that improves on the first, but this one manages it easily! It takes all the structures established in book one, builds on them, improves them, and brings depth and sense to almost everything that was problematic in the first book!

As before, Caitlin Davies gives us an excellent performance. She has a great assortment of voices with excellent vocal inflections and solid tempo shifts throughout. My one complaint (apart from not liking her choices for the Dragon voices) is that one of the character voices is not consistent. Or, more specifically, her accent is not consistent. She goes back and forth between neutral (US) and Irish accent, which was a bit jarring.

Now, clearly these two books were originally meant as a single book, as many of the events depicted here happen concurrently with book one.

I can't help thinking it would have made a much more compelling and satisfying experience if read as a single volume. But as it is, I would say that no reader should stop after book one. This one is such an intrinsic part of the story that is difficult to understand book one without this one for context.

That said, this book gives us a deep dive into the characters we met in book one that disappeared right at the start. I actually find myself liking these characters (and storyline) quite a bit more than those in Ezaara.

Much like the first book, we have a strong coming of age arc complete with a romance subplot that turns out to be far different from what was expected.

Although this romance is almost as fast as that in book one, I actually enjoyed this one a lot more. I think it's in the particulars of how it all happens, that this one just feels a lot more believable. It has a much realer feel to it.

There are definitely some weighty topics being dealt with and at times this book get very dark. It almost brought me to tears more than once, yet had me laughing out loud at others.

There are a few elements that are a touch on the predictable side and the abruptness of the POV switches are sometimes a bit jarring, but elsewise the writing is absolutely fantastic.

The final climax is tense, suspenseful, and exciting, and left me feeling thoroughly satisfied. This is the kind of emotional response I expect from an awesome book!

At this point, I can't recommend this series strongly enough! Now I'm off to read book three.

Coming of age!

This heart-warming dragon adventure splits into multiple plotlines. The first volume was about Ezaara. This volume revolves around her twin brother Tomaaz with sub-plots concerning his father, mother, and Lovina. Tomaaz and his father Haanz must prepare Lush Valley for the coming tharuk attack. Tomaaz befriends Lovina, a village girl who has been abused by her guardian; igniting new feelings in Tomaaz. Tomaaz’s mother Marlise has been quested to save the dragon queen’s son in an effort to repay her debt to the queen. The evil Commander Zens and his army of tharuks continue to threaten Dragon’s Realm. Several twists and turns add to the excitement and expand the story. It’s a wonderful tale that holds your attention throughout. I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.