Dealing with Dragons

[unforth]

It makes me so happy that people have read Dealing with Dragons. I read that book when I was in 4th grade, and I have frequently credited it with my becoming the fantasy geek I am today. Before that, I read mainstream kid stuff, like Babysitters Club and Boxcar Children and Little House books. Within a year of reading Wrede, I had read Piers Anthony, David Eddings, Terry Brooks, Tolkien, Robert Jordan, and more...yeah...anyway, I have lots of work to do, but it makes me happy.

Comments

[nekomata.livejournal.com]

I didn't realize it was that old. O_O; Myself, I migrated from fairy tales, to Anne McCaffery to Anthony to Mercedes Lackey and so on. I didn't really get into -real-(I use this term loosely) young adult stuff until I was a junior in highschool. The only regular kids' books I had as a child were my mom's Little House collection, and a ton of inherited fairy tale books, along with things we got for free at school.
Before I discovered fantasy and sci-fi I usually read informational books, like encyclopedias and almanacs. I still have notes from elementary teachers about how I was anti-social and read too much. -_-

[drydem.livejournal.com]

Lloyd Alexander was my gateway writer. Though I never had a Robert Jordan problem, I did deal with a *cough*dragonlance novel addiction during middle school.

[nekomata.livejournal.com]

As an aside, when I was in L533, Library Materials for Children and Young Adults, 4 different people did their book talks on Dealing with Dragons. ^^ I forget what I did for mine...other than The Dreaming Place...

[tooth-and-claw.livejournal.com]

Holy crap I loved those books.

[unforth.livejournal.com]

a Robert Jordan problem

That's exactly what it is. It's like a disease.

[unforth.livejournal.com]

How...odd. I wouldn't have thought of that...that said, they are GREAT books for kids. :)

[unforth.livejournal.com]

:) Me too...except the last one...I didn't really like the last one at all...

[nekomata.livejournal.com]

The last one sucked. The end. :p

[nekomata.livejournal.com]

There were alot of fantasy buffs in that class, and I'm thinking that the books were recently re-released or something, and therefore showing up on alot of people's radars.

[unforth.livejournal.com]

Here's what got me, and it's really simple.

In the second book, we discover the simple fact that Morwen's cats can penetrate the wizards' barriers.

What has Mendenbar trapped in the castle? One of the wizards' barriers.

Case closed. This was so obvious to me that I WROTE AN ALTERNATE ENDING TO THE THIRD BOOK when I was a kid. Seriously.

[nekomata.livejournal.com]

Well, that, and the characters were really weak! They just seemed to lack -life-.

[d-c-m.livejournal.com]

I am tempted to buy the whole series as it looks like soo much fun.

[unforth.livejournal.com]

I could dig up my copies if you wanted to borrow them...They're a little juvenile, but they are a lot of fun, very tongue in cheek, especially the first two (the third is a bit more serious and the fourth kind of stinks).

[d-c-m.livejournal.com]

Hmmm... Wow this would be nice. Would you mind lending them to me? I promise to take good care of them. And I don't mind juvenile. I think right now juvenile fantasy is better than adult fantasy. Really.

[selenya.livejournal.com]

I loved Dealing with Dragons when I was younger. :)

And I agree about juvenile fantasy being better than adult fantasy right now. ;) Read Tithe by Holly Black? It's awesome.

[unforth.livejournal.com]

I've noticed the high quality of juvenile fantasy, also...makes me wish I had more time to read. :)

[fallenrose.livejournal.com]

I've never heard of that, actually... see, I was a huge Pern fan when I was a kid, and last summer I went out and bought most of the extensive (and still going after 30-some years) series used.
This, of course, led to a childhood obsession with dragons-->pterandons-->dinosaurs in general (when I was 10, anyway). I made dragons out of my various construction sets and played with those, rather than making, you know, buildings and cars with them.

Yay Dragons!