Book-A-Day 2018 #143: The Last Dragon by Jane Yolen and Rebecca Guay

I can't prove this is the best strategy, but I tend to read a book first and then research it afterward, when I'm trying to figure out what to write here. As you may have noticed, I can be opinionated, so I try to minimize the chance of having strong opinions about something before I read it -- oh sure, it never entirely works, since you have to know something about a book to even want to pick it up, but I think it helps.

So when I tell you that I had a suspicion that The Last Dragon was based on something, I mean exactly that: a suspicion, lurking in my head as I read the book and particularly Neil Gaiman's introduction. The book itself just said that it was a graphic novel, written by Jane Yolen and painted by Rebecca Guay.

Now that I have finished reading it, I can google away. And so I find from Yolen's site that it was based on something: her 1985 story "Dragonfield."

Does that change anything? Well...not really. I don't think I've ever read the original story, and it's not like Last Dragon is set in a wider fantasy universe or anything. This is just one story about one place and one group of people. But if you're a huge Jane Yolen fan, you might know the story -- so think of this as a consumer notice.

Last Dragon is vaguely medieval, in the sense that things seem to have been the same way for a long time. There's no sign of lords or wars or that kind of thing -- it's the usual fantasy medieval world, with only as many details as the story needs. There's an archipelago where dragons used to live, long ago before men came. When men came, they killed all the dragons, of course -- that's what men do.

It's now two hundred years later, and dragons are barely a memory in the town of Meddlesome, far out at the end of those islands. But we the readers know one lost dragon's egg has emerged and hatched, and that there is one dragon, growing and eating, not too far from Meddlesome.

But in that town, there's a herbalist who has three daughters -- a serious, hardworking one; a dreamy, wool-gathering one; and an inspired, driven one. That third daughter, Tansy, is our heroine, as of course she must be -- it's always the youngest child of a matched set.

Eventually the dragon is found and the threat understood, but it takes a while: meeting the dragon is generally equivalent to being eaten by him, so there are only rumors and fear for a while. Meddlesome knows it must slay the dragon, but those skills are long dead. A few young men set off to find a hero, and come back with someone who looks like a hero.

And, eventually, the heroine becomes part of a plan that bears an odd resemblance to the plot of A Bug's Life. (But, again, the original story here was from 1985; much earlier.) And the title is both true and, in the end, not true, when there is no longer a "last dragon."

This is a relatively simple fantasy story, with a dragon that is a destructive force but nothing more. It doesn't talk, like those of Tolkien or Le Guin, doesn't hoard treasure, doesn't have old secrets. It's just a big, destructive animal that's difficult to kill -- but "difficult" is not the same as "impossible." There are moral lessons along the way, but fairly benign and positive ones.

Guay brings a painterly feel to this story -- the cover doesn't well represent her work inside, for whatever inexplicable reason. Her work here is generally realistic, but becomes flatter at times, perhaps for that fairy-tale feel. It's evocative art that grounds the world well -- these are real places and people, and a dragon of flesh and blood and fire.

Last Dragon is a perfectly nice little fantasy story: I didn't love it, but I liked and respected it. It may just be that I have seen far too many stories about dragons for far too many years to be able work up much enthusiasm for this fairly basic version. If you've read much less fantasy yardgoods than I have, it shouldn't bother you.