I really wish I could have liked this book more because the idea of it was so interesting and I loved the world. But I didn't enjoy it as much as I would have liked. I had a hard time rating this book because it was unique, but I wasn't a huge fan of it. I mean, I feel like I would have liked it better if I was comfortable with the writing style. If someone were to ask me what I thought of this book, this would be my reaction: “There was, apparently, no honor in driver's ed.” This book is

So FUN!Such an interesting premise! It's an alternate history in which dragons regularly ravage the world, and are fought off by trained dragon slayers. Dragon slaying has become sort of a paramilitary job, and one family in Canada wants to break free and sort of bring back the glory days. They do this by pairing up their young dragon slayer in training, Owen, with a schoolmate, the musically gifted Siobhan. Siobhan will be Owen's bard, and will tell stories and write songs about his deeds and t...

Okay, hang on...Good to go now. That was really stressful, and no small amount of heartbreaking. This is an amazing book. If it was murder horses instead of dragons it would be 100% my aesthetic, because DAMN. It's got diversity, Canadian pride, music and folklore, rural small towns... Everything I could want! It's basically a book about my childhood and youth, right down to the mention of Junior Farmers (although I did 4-H instead) and using broken hockey sticks as swords. While I did not grow

It took me a really, really long time to get through this, probably longer than was warranted by the quality of the story. Much as I admired it (hence the four stars) I never really felt connected to it; it was a beautiful story, with a beautiful sense of place and history and intriguing characters, but I think it's Siobhan's telling of the story, and her frequent insertion of historical detail, that kept it at a remove from me. Or it was a result of taking so long to read it. In any case, I fou...

I know it's not cool to "review" a book you didn't finish, so please take this with a huge grain of salt. I wish Goodreads had a separate category for DNF and categories for why you couldn't keep going so they could be separate from the actual reviews. I was intrigued by what I'd read about the narrator telling different versions of the story, but just couldn't get past a logic obstacle. At first, I was thrown by the question of why people don't just blow dragons up with missiles, but I read som...

I really, really enjoyed this book. First and foremost, this is a really unique take on dragons and dragon tales. Owen, Siobhan, and their families live in the real world, as it is today, in rural Canada. Nothing has changed. History has all still occurred exactly as it really did. Except that there are dragons. So sometimes the history occurred in a slightly different way or for a slightly different reason. It's a very cool idea. Because of this, Owen and Siobhan are basically normal high schoo...

3.5 starsInventive and original, I enjoyed the story and the characters. A lot. Owen and Siobhan were wonderful and their friendship was a delight to watch develop. I thoroughly liked the premise of a modern dragonslayer and all the changes that would bring to our world should dragons be roaming the earth. I wondered what it would be like - to lose something you love so much and have to live surrounded by constant reminders of it. I hoped that I would never find out.Foreshadowing, much? As soon

This book is just so funny, warm, and just lovable in every way. Dragon-slayers in modern Canada! And the wry, deadpan voice of the narrator, Siobhan (Owen's bard, a wonderfully geeky, music- and history-obsessed girl whom I - surprise, surprise! - adore) is my favorite part of the whole book. (In different ways, the writing style reminds me a bit of Connie Willis and a bit of Robin McKinley in her contemporary, SUNSHINE/SHADOWS mode, but really, it's just original and heartfelt and funny and pe...

This book was a required read for my Young Adult Literature class as part of my MLIS program.So… I’m not going to write a formal review of The Story of Owen. I’m just going to post my thoughts that I wrote for a couple assignments in my class. Unfortunately, this book was not my favorite. Its had its moments, but overall I had some complaints I could not reconcile.1. It started out very slowly for me, and never really picked up very much. Maybe things were a bit slow going because the author too...

Interesting concept, but D-U-L-L. Notice any exclamation points? T'was that bored.

I liked the adventure and the exploration of how true (or not, or incompletely) storytelling can be. I also liked that unusually there was no romantic element: The female narrator makes it clear that neither she nor Owen are interested in such a relationship on top of their friendship. The convoluted narrative line was confusing after a while, though, and the insertion of dragons and their dangers into our world's history worked as a metaphor for pollution (dragons are attracted to carbon emissi...

I will write more about this book closer to its pub date, (full review on Pink Me http://pinkme.typepad.com/pink-me/201...) but here is the quick version - SO GREAT. Unusually, spectacularly great. Very assured for a first novel. Full of banter and heart and imagination, but also terrifically grounded in the real world. I will give it to my 12-year-old son, I will give it to my friend's 14-year-old daughter, it will be perfect for a large large number of teens, especially those who think romance...

I think, to answer the question posed by the review form, that I really want to see the discussion when friends have read this one. That desire is not the only reason I'm hoping lots of friends do read it, because I think it's unusual and interesting and not perfect but mostly in ways that make me eager to discuss, rather than frustrated and bored. In no particular order, some thoughts: (Oh, but first - if you are like me, you will be confused by the subtitle "Dragon Slayer of Trondheim", or ope...