A review by rhiannoncs
Buried Fire by Jonathan Stroud
2.0
This was a real "wasted potential" book. The basic idea was really kind of cool - a dragon has been lying dormant beneath an English village for centuries, and periodically people will stumble close to its lair and receive the "gifts of the dragon" (the ability to see auras, pyrokinesis, flight, and telepathy, abilities which manifest themselves gradually). And now the dragon is going to be set free, which sounds very exciting.
The book suffers from so many technical problems that it's hard to enjoy it, though. He has major issues with shifting POV, the characters are 2-dimensional, and the pacing is off. Add to that the fact that there are only two female characters and they're both extremely passive, and I wasn't really a happy camper.
I would recommend picking up the Bartimaus Trilogy, but steering clear of Buried Fire. This is very much an early novel, before he and his editors really worked things out.
The book suffers from so many technical problems that it's hard to enjoy it, though. He has major issues with shifting POV, the characters are 2-dimensional, and the pacing is off. Add to that the fact that there are only two female characters and they're both extremely passive, and I wasn't really a happy camper.
I would recommend picking up the Bartimaus Trilogy, but steering clear of Buried Fire. This is very much an early novel, before he and his editors really worked things out.