BOOK REVIEW | THE END OF DRAGONS | MARK STAY

 

Book Review

THE END OF DRAGONS

MARK STAY

 

ABOUT THE BOOK

To Survive, They Must Kill The Last of Her Kind.

The Lapis Moon is gone. Magic is dying. The world has moved on.

Mages, however, are an endangered species. Sander Bree is scraping a living as a mage for hire, Rosheen Katell is in hiding with her brother Oskar. All mages are outlawed, exiled, dodging assassins and the wrath of Archbishop Yorath Pasco who would gladly have them skewered in public.

Then a dragon attacks a small fishing village on the Parthalan coast. Dragons aren’t supposed to exist in these enlightened times, and so the Archbishop suggests a deal: if Sander and Rosheen use their magic to slay the dragon without fuss then their slates will be wiped clean. Of course, they encounter personal betrayals, political backstabbing, criminal shenanigans and a bloody great dragon in a rollicking adventure that will keep you on the edge of your seat.

REVIEW

Author of the Woodfield Witches series, Mark Stay returns to the world of The End of Magic in this second book of the series The End of Dragons.

Originally billed as a standalone, the series has now been expanded to a three-book series, with the final instalment released in 2025.

In the original series, we followed the three main characters of Sander Bree, Rosheen Katell and her moon child brother Oskar as they learned to live in a world where the Lapis Moon (the power of all things magical) was destroyed, subsequently changing their lives forever.

The End of Dragons begins immediately where The End of Magic finished and takes up the story of Gudrun Falk, who along with Rosheen Katell’s brother, Oskar is a moon child. Moon children were different from other people and they had their senses dulled by the moon, and before the fall of the moon seemed to have very limited intelligence or ability. However, when the moon exploded, instead of having their magic taken away like Sander and Rosheen, their innate powers became stronger.

Injured and left alone at the mountainous springs of healing in the first book, Gudrun has to adapt to life when Oskar fails to return to her. Waking up and gathering her strength, Gudrun travels down the mountain to live a simple life in a village at the bottom of the mountain until her past catches up to her.

Moving forward five years, we then rejoin Sander Bree and Rosheen Katell. Sander is living as a jobbing mage, who along with the last elf Malachy (and a horde of Lapis moon stones to give him magical abilities) is travelling around making a living hiring himself out.

Rosheen, on the other hand has moved into the family business of being a dung collector, whilst attempting to maintain control of her brother Oskar, who in the first book, found his magical powers as a moon child and scared her and the rest of the world half to death.

The End of Dragons is a fantastic addition to the first and continues the story wonderfully. Mixing humour and gritty fantasy, Mark Stay has written an absolutely brilliant book.

If you have read his Witches of Woodville series, you will be accustomed to how he writes such well realised characters, and with The End of Dragons Mark Stay expands on the characters, particularly Malachy.

The End of Dragons is a page turning piece of fantasy and there were many times I was both laughing out loud and gasping at the twists and turns in the book, particularly when we are introduced to the dragon. 

Mark Stay never lets up throughout the book and there is adventure aplenty as both Sander and Rosheen get themselves into a variety of scrapes. 

This was one of my most anticipatd books of the year and I can never shout loud enough how brilliant this series is. If you like Pratchettesque humour, mixed with gritty fantasy, I urge you to pick this series up.