Readers' rating:
Published Feb 2010
496 pages
Genre: Fantasy, Sci-Fi, Speculative, Alt. History
Publication Information
Enter the spellbinding world of dragons ... and those who tend them
One of the most gifted fantasy authors writing today, New York Times bestselling author Robin Hobb has dazzled readers with brilliantly imaginative, emotionally resonant, and compulsively readable tales set in far-flung realms not unlike our own. In this enthralling new novel, she returns to the territory of her beloved Liveship Traders and Tawny Man trilogies with a story of dragons and humans, return and rebirth, and the search for meaning, belonging, and home.
For years, the Trader cities valiantly battled their enemies, the Chalcedeans. But they could not have staved off invasion without the powerful dragon Tintaglia. In return, the Traders promised to help her serpents migrate up the Rain Wild River after a long exile at sea—to find a safe haven and, Tintaglia hopes, to restore her species. But too much time has passed, and the newly hatched dragons are damaged and weak, and many die. The few who survive cannot use their wings; earthbound, they are powerless to hunt and vulnerable to human predators willing to kill them for the fabled healing powers of dragon flesh.
But Tintaglia has vanished and the Traders are weary of the labor and expense of tending useless dragons. The Trader leadership fears that if it stops providing for the young dragons, the hungry and neglected creatures will rampage—or die along the river's acidic muddy banks. To avert catastrophe, the dragons decree a move even farther up the treacherous river to Kelsingra, their ancient, mythical homeland whose mysterious location is locked deep within the dragons' uncertain ancestral memories.
To ensure their safe passage, the Traders recruit a disparate group of young people to care for the damaged creatures and escort them to their new home. Among them is Thymara, an unschooled forest girl of sixteen, and Alise, a wealthy Trader's wife trapped in a loveless marriage, who attaches herself to the expedition as a dragon expert. The two women share a deep kinship with the dragons: Thymara can instinctively communicate with them, and Alise, captivated by their beauty and majesty, has devoted her life to studying them.
Embarking on an arduous journey that holds no promise of return, the band of humans and dragons must make their way along the toxic and inhospitable Rain Wild River—an extraordinary odyssey that will teach them lessons about themselves and one another, as they experience hardships, betrayals, and joys beyond their wildest dreams.
"Hobb's meticulously realized fantasy tale is a welcome addition to contemporary dragon lore." - Publishers Weekly
"Starred Review. This book is imaginative, literate, and compassionate from first page to last." - Booklist
"Human and dragon characters achieve a remarkable degree of believability in this inventive saga..." - Library Journal
"A nicely imagined fantasy setting that will engage readers and raise anticipation for the second installment." - Kirkus Reviews
This information about Dragon Keeper was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Robin Hobb, real name Margaret Astrid Lindholm Ogden, was born in 1952 in California. At nine years of age she and her family left California to live a self-sufficient life in Alaska. After graduating from high school, she attended Denver University before returning to Alaska. She married a local fisherman, and they moved to a small island of the coast of Alaska. She submitted her first story that same year.
Over the course of the following 10 years Robin Hobb had three children and she also managed to continue writing and submitting stories. 1982 brought the sale of her first book, Harpy’s Flight and three other books with the same characters quickly followed. After several collaborations and more published work she sat down to start something different, a piece of work under the...
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