Review: Dragon Maid
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 01 15, 2014
Dragon Maid was such a captivating continuation of the Dragon Lore series. Gimpel weaves a story full of all the things I love most: passion, adventure, intrigue, and smexy times with a most delicious alpha male.Dragon Maid immediately picks up the story from To Love a Highland Dragon. Lachlan and Maggie are happily mated but the battle again The Morrigan and the red and black Wyvern wages on. Lachlan implores the Celtic gods Gwydion, Ceridwen, and Arawn for help in stymieing The Morrigan's evil influence in the world. But just like the gods, the yield no help. So Lachlan, his dragon (Kheladin), Maggie, her grandmother (Mary Elma), and her friend (Mauvreen) try to come up with their own battle strategy. While holding court with Mauvreen's coven of witches in his hoard, Kheladin is intrigued by a male witch. The witch, Jonathan Shea, has a reservoir of untapped power and potential. As he begins to probe deeper there is a disturbance that has signaled an unexpected arrival. Instantly on guard, Kheladin's strengthen the ward guarding his hoard and prepares to attack. But, their unexpected guest, or guests as it would seem are not foes but friends. The gods in their muted benevolence send help in the form of Britta and her dragon, Tarika. When Britta first arrives she is brash and arrogant and regards Jonathan as nothing more than a servant to torment and to demand he do her bidding. But the tide on that relationship quickly changes as Britta and Jonathan spend time with one another. The attraction for Britta is fairly instant on Jonathan's side -- seeing how Britta arrived sans clothing -- but it takes Britta a bit longer (not much) for her attraction to Jonathan to heat her veins.But, evil waits for no man...or woman...errr...dragon. As Jonathan is helping to acclimate Britta to this time period by taking her shopping for clothing and food, they are attacked by the red Wyvern. Quickly Britta, Jonathan, and Tarika are thrown into a battle situation that they were not expecting, at least not so soon. In that moment Jonathan puts himself on the line for Britta and Tarika, and Britta and Tarika truly understand his importance to them. Will they live long enough to tell him is the question?!?!?I am a sucker for shifter romances, and if done well, they have the capacity to draw me into a story unlike any other genre of fiction can do. I have to say that Dragon Maid was such a story! The characters were multidimensional and the world that Gimpel created was extremely compelling! I was captivated by the depth of each character, their motivations, and their interactions between one another. I loved the epiphany that Britta had about Tarika. After being together for hundreds of years a separation and a near loss allowed her to see how much she loved her dragon and friend. The reader is able to see more from the gods in this story, and there is an added twist of Jonathan's surprise parentage. That was brilliantly done, by the way. I hope to some development in that storyline in successive books. Additionally, the reader is also able to see more into the "human" aspects of The Morrigan. In To Love a Highland Dragon and early in this book, she retained her battle crow format but she showed her true form and then she split herself into all of her forms. What happened after that was kind of shiver inducing. The Morrigan is just pure evil and she will continue to wreak havoc on the world because even after all her heinous crimes against dragons and humanity, the other gods eschewed any kind of punishment.I love this series and each story builds upon the other but they just get better and better! I look forward to reading more.Ratings Detail:Rating for male protagonist: 4★Rating for female protagonist: 4★Rating for secondary characters: 4★Plot Viability: 4★General Storyline: 4★Story Ending: 4★Ease of Reading: 4★Overall rating: 4★