https://tamaranth.blogspot.com/2023/08/2023116-golden-age-naomi-novik.html ( )

After a couple recent disappointing reads, I was feeling myself start to slip into a book slump. I knew I needed a guaranteed win, and who better to turn to than Naomi Novik? I thought I’d seen the last of Laurence and Temeraire until this lovely illustrated story collection popped up in my Goodreads feed. It was just the thing to defeat this book slump before it took hold.

I’ll break it down from least fave to fave:

3-3.5 stars for “Volly’s Cow,” “Planting Season,” and the “drabbles” at the end. The drabbles—stories told in 100 words—were a nice way to showcase a lot of art, but I didn’t find them super memorable. I did appreciate the imagination and humor in them.

4 stars for “Dawn of Battle” and “Succession,” which focused on important supporting characters—Jane Roland in her first command and Temeraire’s mother Qian before he was born.

5 stars for “The Golden Age” and “Dragons and Decorum.” I loved these so much, I couldn’t stop smiling while I read them.

“The Golden Age” is an alternate beginning for Laurence and Temeraire, a “what if” story where instead of being taken as a prize of war, Temeraire (he has a different name in this story) is in a shipwreck and hatches alone on a deserted island. I loved how Novik reimagined how he and Laurence found each other. It’s such an imaginative thing to do—she basically wrote really good fanfic of her own fiction.

“Dragons and Decorum” was a delightful surprise. I was beside myself when I realized Novik had reimagined Pride and Prejudice in Temeraire’s world, with Elizabeth a captain in the Aerial Corps. I’m a huge sucker for Pride and Prejudice retellings, and this story made my heart sing with its clever reversals.

I’m tempted to do creative math and give this 5 stars, but overall I’d say it’s a 4-star read for me. Still, I may need to own a copy of this just to keep those two stories close.

A must-read for fans of the Temeraire series.

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With the Temeraire series solidly concluded, imagine my surprise when I stumbled upon this anthology. This features 6 short stories and a series of "drabbles." Every story has an accompanying piece of Temeraire fanart, submitted by readers for a contest.

Volly's Cow: Short and simple, capturing the most appealing aspect of the dragons interacting.

Planting Season: We finally get more on American dragons. I loved seeing the differences in culture between the continents, although I wold have liked a little more conflict in this one.

Dawn of Battle: More background on Jane. Always nice to see a badass lady captain.

Golden Age: This one is decidedly non-canon, an alternate retelling where Temeraire hatches on an island and is raised by other dragons after the French ship is sunk. This one gets a lot of flack - "She's writing fanfiction for her own series!" But I'm a huge fan of What If stories (Red Son is one of my favorite Superman titles) and this felt more in line with that than fanfiction. I don't know if it was just me, but the opening is fairly heartbreaking.

Succession: I loved 99% of this story. The topic, the writing, the voice, the perspective. Only one thing irritated me. Temeraire was secretly the first born egg after all! Temeraire has always tread perilously close to super speshul territory (I have appreciated other dragons showing him up or being more valuable/influential on occasion) and this felt like a nudge in a direction I didn't like.

Dragons and Decorum: Pride and Predjudice and Dragons. /shrug

Drabbles: These are a variant of flash fiction - a story of 100 words (in this case, exactly 100 words). Some of these appear to be part of the canon, some are alternate worlds, and some are just funny. As you might imagine, it was a mixed bag. Some were fantastic, such as Temeraire's take on Beowulf, or Elsie planning to travel the world. Some just were duds, like....Laurence as a modern day surfing tourist?

There's also a drabble for Rule 34 fanart. Not kidding. I found it hilarious, to be honest, but I feel like I'd be remiss if I didn't warn you about/mention that. However, if you are of delicate sensibilites, be assured: unlike the blog post I linked above from Novik's official site, the book does censor the image a bit - a tree mysteriously appeared to hide the gargantuan, throbbing dragon penis. There's a strange, small part of me almost disappointed by this - I feel like if you are going to include, well, that, then at least commit.

Overall, a solid 4. The book clocks in at 184 pages, about double the length of Closure, Ltd that I read earlier, but a LOT of it was the drabbles. Of the two, I think Novik pulled off this type of anthology way better. I appreciated so much about the book. Its physically gorgeous, with wonderful dustjacket art and beautiful golden hardcover. I thought the inclusion of fanart was like a love letter to fans - I love seeing their takes on the different dragon breeds (although there's some fanart that I loved and thought was a bit better that wasn't here). The drabbles format was novel to me and I really like seeing the author take some risks while also providing a solid array of 'standard' content. It was both new and familiar. Part of me wishes some older content, like the short story "Vici" was reprinted here as well - that would have bumped it to a 5 for me. ( )

Lovely collection of short stories. I always find collections like this a bit uneven, and so it was with this one, but there were three very enjoyable stories which definitely made it worth getting & reading:
"Golden Age": Dragon pirates - great fun!, "Succession": A slightly sad story about how the Chinese came to give up a precious dragon egg, & "Dragons & Decorum", a brilliant story featuring Mr Darcy & Elisabeth Bennett as an aviator captain. ( )

This book is a sparkling jewel box full of trinkets for lovers of Temeraire and his world. The crown is Dragons and Decorum, in which Captain Elizabeth Bennett is stationed with the Seventh Wing at Meryton. It is the only in period re-telling of [Pride and Prejudice] that I have really liked ans [[Naomi Novik]] fuses just enough old and new material to form a delightful whole. Would the author do as well with Sharpe or Capt. Aubrey? One can only hope. ( )