Memoirs of Lady Trent Series by Marie Brennan

[lightreads]

A Natural History of Dragons, Tropic of Serpents, Voyage of the Basilisk, In the Labyrinth of Drakes, Within the Sanctuary of Wings

3/5. Series of fictional memoirs of a dragon naturalist in a secondary fantasy world inspired by eighteenth-centuryish Europe/Asia/Africa.

Excellent fun adventure stories told in a brisk, ferociously dragon nerd style. These books neatly balance the travel and adventure and discovery with consciousness of gender, race, and class privilege and oppression. The fun isn't ruined, but it's definitely not unalloyed either. That's tough to pull off.

But perhaps the most unusual thing about these books, and the thing I appreciated most, is the presentation of a strong, abiding male-female friendship and partnership that starts out antagonistic, warms up, and is never even the tiniest bit romantic. It's amazing.

Content notes: Discussion of miscarriage.

Comments

[readerjane]

Sounds like just my thing. TBR'd.

[conuly]

They're great, though a little slow to get to the action. In the last book, after learning HUGE PLOT SPOILER THINGS, the protagonist spends an inordinate amount of time herding yaks.

That is 100% my jam, and I would read a dozen more just like them.