Review: Dragon’s keep by Janet Lee Carey

Title: Dragon’s Keep
Author: Janet Lee Carey
Genre: Young Adult
Hardcover: 320 pages
Publisher: Harcourt Children’s Books; 1 edition (April 1, 2007)
Source: Review Copy
Rating: 4 out of 5

My thoughts:
I always wanted to read a fairy tale for adults. So I picked up Dragon’s keep with an eagerness you wont find me picking other books with. And I’ll tell you right away what a lovely fairy tale it is. Well, okay, it is for young adults though. I just wanted to clear that.

Dragon’s keep has everything a fairy tale should have. A princess, an island with a castle, a curse, a witch, a villain and dragons. Oh and yes, a handsome warrior too.

600 years ago Evaine, the younger sister of King Arther from England marries someone below her status and is banished from England forever. She comes to Wilde Island for refuge. According to Merlin’s prophecy, the 21st princess of the Wilde Island will restore the name of the Pendragon and end the war between humans and dragons with the wave of a hand.

But ending the war is difficult when the princess is a 14 year old girl and the dragon’s occasionally feeds on the people from the Island. The King trains many people over the years to fight the dragon. But these trained knights are no match to a huge flying dragon who spits fire.

Also Princess Rosalind has a secret. She has a dragon claw. Her overprotective mother hides Rosalind’s hands from the world by forcing her to wear golden gloves. Her mother does not want people to know that Rosalind has a claw that resembles the claws of their most dreaded enemy, the dragon. She has her mind set on getting Rosalind married to Price Henry of England and so finding a cure for the dragon claw is always the top priority.

One day a convoy from the Queen of England comes to the Wilde Island to judge Princess Rosalind as a future match for Prince Henry. oops…..I am going to spoil the story a bit here. Or maybe I won’t. Let me skip the spoiler, however minor it is.

After a certain turn of events, Princess Rosalind is abducted by the dragon and taken to his cave, the dragon’s keep. Here the princess cannot escape from the dragon’s clutches even if she could. Her entire life changes in the matter of a single moment. The time she spends with the dragon’s eventually helps her in ending the war between the dragon’s and the humans, literally with the wave of her hand.

Janet Lee Carey’s writing is beautiful and even poetic at times. The first half although interesting is a little slow, but the second half is amazing.

Dragons keep is a fairy tale with a fitting dramatic and happily ever after ending. Read this book if you like fairy tales, adventure, fantasy and a good story.