Author: Julie Kagawa
Publisher: Harlequin Teen
Publication Date: October 28, 2014
Pages: 449
Format: Hardcover/Own
THE DRAGONS OF TALON: Once hunted nearly to extinction, they are now poised to take over the world.
THE ORDER OF ST. GEORGE: The legendary dragonslayers will stop at nothing to wipe dragons from the face of the earth.
These mortal enemies are locked in secret and deadly combat, with humanity none the wiser.
To take her rightful place in the Talon organization, young dragon Ember Hill must prove she can hide her true nature and blend in with humans. Her delight at the prospect of a summer of "normal" teen experiences is short-lived, however, once she discovers that she's also expected to train for her destined career in Talon. But a chance meeting with a rogue dragon will soon challenge everything Ember has been taught.
As Ember struggles to accept her future, St. George soldier Garret Xavier Sebastian is tasked with hunting her down. But when faced with Ember's bravery, confidence and all-too-human desires, Garret begins to question everything the Order has ingrained in him—and what he might be willing to give up to uncover the truth about dragons.
Review: Overall, I genuinely enjoyed Talon. I do enjoy a good dragon novel and was not disappointed with this. Plus its Julie Kagawa. She writes some pretty awesome books.
So I'll just start with my big complaint about the book. I felt like it took a while to really get the story going. We get like half a book of our characters trying to assimilate and blend in with humans and pretty much hanging out with these characters day to day as they build friendships, relationships, etc. While I get that this stuff is important to the story line, it felt like the first half of the book was just dragging on. It seemed like most of the mind blowing secrets and action scenes were left for the last third of the book. So while I like the story and everything, I didn't love book one because everything was so dragged out in the first half. I'm glad I pushed through though because the second half was amazing. I definitely think the series going forward will be better since we got a lot of the establishing characters and backgrounds out of the way now.
I really liked our main characters Ember, Garrett and Riley. I loved how all three of these characters were able to think outside of the respective organizations they came from and see that things were definitely not as they seemed. Riley is a Rogue who left Talon a while ago after finding out the truth about what they do behind closed doors and has been saving other dragons from Talons grasps. He is so focused on saving other dragons that Talon wants to kill for not being good enough or questioning anything. Ember is training for her position in Talon but does not like the strict rules, the secrets being kept, the fact they choose what position you will hold and the fact they don't tell you until you prove yourself in training. It's not pleasant having your entire life planned out with absolutely no say in it. Garrett is a soldier with St. George. It's all he's ever know. Hunt dragons, kill them, next mission. Until he meets Ember and realizes St. George just might be wrong about dragons when Ember shows that she has a very human side that they supposedly shouldn't have.
I have to admit, I thought it was kinda funny how Talon tells Ember and Dante they are supposed to assimilate and blend into the human world. But then their Talon guardians get pissed off when they actually act human. And Dante is just so brainwashed he goes along with everything from Talon. The moment I thought was the funniest is when their Talon guardians were raging on Ember about potentially getting hurt surfing. Saying if she keeps putting herself in danger by doing activities like that they'll force her to give it up. NEWSFLASH. Humans put themselves in danger all the time to do activities like that. Keeping her from doing activities like that in a beach town is going to make every one more suspicious, not less. And then getting up in arms when Ember doesn't eat dinner on occasion cuz she's having a hard time dealing with stuff. Again, humans actually do that a lot too. I don't know how many times I've just picked at my food instead of scarfing it down cuz something was on my mind. They got a lot of nerve saying fit in with humans, but then getting pissed off for doing things humans do. All they wanna do is force the idea that dragons are superior to humans and it should be no issue to act like it. Oy.
I do have to admit, Ember was definitely naive at the end. Expecting her brother to go rogue with her. He literally is Talon's poster child. As soon as he told Ember he'll meet her at the rendezvous point, should have set off alarms. He could have sat in the car when she met Garrett before leaving if he wanted to go. The fact he found an excuse to not go with her should have told Ember he was going to betray her. But she was so wrapped up in thinking her brother cared more for her than Talon despite his constant actions that she let her judgement be clouded when it came to him. I am super interested in what Ember and Riley are now planning when it comes to saving Garrett in Rogue.
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