Dragonlance

Last Friday we had nearly ten inches of snow here in the Bluegrass. This Florida boy loved it. I finished my previous read on Saturday and sat down staring at my TBR pile threatening to topple over on the end table beside my recliner. I was experiencing that familiar unease as I tried to decide what my next read would be. Then it hit me that as season descended outside I should read a book of winter inside while I sat next to the fire. There was one stacked neatly there that I’d been thinking of returning to for a ages, and now seemed like the time to pick it up once more.

So what am I reading? Well…It’s Dragons of Winter Night by Margaret Weiss and Tracy Hickman.

Book Blurb

Dragons
Creatures of legend. Stories told to children.
But now dragons have returned to Krynn. The darkness of war and destruction threatens to engulf the land.
A small band of heroes brings hope to the land. But the hope is fragile as a rose and many be lost completely, shattered by the bitter winds of winter.
Knights and barbarian, warrior and half-elf, dwarf and kender and dark-souled mage; they begin a perilous search for two artifacts that may help them or lead them to their destruction-
the Dragon Orbs…
and the legendary Dragonlance.
Goodreads Blurb

If you’ve followed my blog for a while you may remember that the Dragonlance books were my gateway into SFF. Starting with the Chronicles trilogy, then the Legends trilogy, then branching out into other series I poured over those books in my youth (back in the early 90’s) and fell in love with the genre. In November of 2019 I decided I would attempt to reread them and maybe even read those books I never got to back in the day. There are over 100 books in total and I hadn’t even read half of them. That month I hosted a read along of Book one of the Chronicles, Dragons of Autumn Twilight, and a group of us read and discussed this fav book of mine; some like me returning to it from years apart and others coming to it for the very first time. It was fun and I had planned to read book two later that winter.

Then a plague arrived and…well things got disrupted.

I’ve been meaning to pick up where I left off and I just never found the right moment. Until this weekend. In part it was the weather. In part it was a desire for a comfort read. In part it was knowing I needed to get a move on because Weiss and Hickman are releasing a new novel in the Dragonlance world later this year titled Dragons of Deceit. If I hope to read that book I need to get caught up once more on the series.

So here I am, picking up the journey with Tanis, Flint, Tasselhoff, Sturm, Laurana, Tika, Goldmoon, Riverwind, Caramon, and Raistlin. The Heroes of the Lance. I know what’s going to happen. I know it will hit me hard. But I read on anyway because it reminds me of my youth and the magic that made me fall in love with this genre. Maybe that’s what I need most right now to help pull me out of this multi-year funk.

So here’s to comfort reads and nostalgia, and new things that may come of the old…