8 Stars
"Who doesn't love dragons? In this exciting collection, E. Nesbit unleashes a flock of these mysterious, wild, and unpredictable creatures. Here you will meet a dragon who flies out of an enchanted book and swallows an entire soccer team; two children who try to wake St. George while dragons of all shapes and sizes descend on England; and wicked Prince Tiresome, who trades half his kingdom with a pigkeeper to catch a raging dragon. ... Featuring eight of E. Nesbit's best stories, ... [The Book of Dragons] returns...to delight and enchant a new generation of readers." (Taken from the inside cover.)
I happened across this apparently classic children's literature in the same secluded corner as Pat O'Shea's, The Hounds of the Mórrígan. And I have to say, Edith Nesbit's stories are just plain fun! They are each very unique, and while I liked some more than others, the collection feels complete in a way that a lot of short story books just don't. Her writing style reminds me very much of A. A. Milne's (she was British and wrote around the turn-of-the-century), especially in her ability to draw in the young reader with innocent humor. Her characters are delightful (bad and good are both lots of fun), and the book as a whole probably only took about two days to get through (at a VERY leisurely pace). I would definitely recommend this to anyone that likes imaginative fantasy with a "folk tale" feel. (I might recommend reading the last story first, though, as it was probably my least favorite in the collection. It left me feeling slightly less satisfied than many of the others. Still worth a read, but I would save one of the others for last, personally.)
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