Paul Boothroyd | Blog

Somewhere around the house there is always one volume of the epic Aubrey/Maturin series by the late, great, phenomenally erudite Patrick O’Brian (photo credit: Wikipedia) adorned with a bookmark. There are 21 volumes and as a portrayal of human relationships, set in the British navy of the Napoleonic era it is, as Stephen Maturin might say, sans pareille. I am on my fifth read of the series. Recent catching up with modern classics has led me into John le Carré’s world of George Smiley – no relation to my George 🙂 – and recent works I’ve enjoyed include Haruki Murakami’s Killing Commendatore (did anyone ever read his Norwegian Wood and NOT enjoy it? ), Benjamin Myers‘ The Offing, where the dialogues with Dulcie are a sheer delight, and Kazuo Ishiguro’s ultra-imaginative Klara and the Sun.

Okay, I admit it – I’ve never read D.J. Conway’s classic Dancing with Dragons or Mystical Dragon Magick. Why not? Because thanks to the very mystical nature of these legendary beasts, everyone is at liberty to dream up their own dragons just the way they want them. Oroflamm, the dragon in George and the Golden Letterseed, is a case in point. While he has the fiery temper and wicked ways of a beast to be loathed and feared, at the same time he has the potential to be a friend in need, as we will see in the forthcoming second volume, George and the Poison Arrow. The two sides to his character are beautifully captured in Britt Harcus’s illustrations – almost adorable in chapter 7; fierce and furious in chapter 10; sick and sorrowful in chapter 20; meek and mild in chapter 24. What you see above are her initial […]