From School Library Journal
Gr 6 Up-Kour'el, a winged being from a distant world, has been carried by a dragonlike creature, Api'Naga, to King Vassill's kingdom. There the monarch is in thrall to the wicked queen Mariah, and Maighdlin, granddaughter of the king's former huntsman, has been taken to serve as a palace slave. Alternating chapters follow the travels of Kour'el and Maighdlin until they meet in a violent climactic moment. The story opens with both young women ignorant about their identities. Kour'el is imprisoned and has been badly hurt; the past comes back to her slowly, in dreams. Maighdlin is living simply in a peasant village; her work with wool becomes a metaphor and recurring image in the story. As the threads of the story are spun, the setting moves from the village and outlying tower to the castle and the surrounding city, where her grandfather attempts to get messages to her and to his old friend, the king. Kour'el escapes and, with Api'Naga, also journeys to the city where, she believes, her task is to rescue the king. When all the characters are in place, in Part Two, the threads are twisted together ever more tightly into a solid yarn. Unfortunately, there are loose ends and knots in the string: characters stumble into locations all too convenient for the plot, and the relationship between Kour'el's world and the world of Vassill's kingdom is never adequately explained. Still, readers who enjoy identifying with heroic female characters will not let the occasional plotting lapses get in the way of their enjoyment of this interestingly constructed fantasy.
Kathleen Isaacs, Edmund Burke School, Washington, DC
Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
--Ce texte provient d'une édition qui n'est plus publiée ou qui est non diponible.
Product Description
On Wings Of A Dragon is published by Fitzhenry and Whiteside.