The Pit Dragon Trilogy

Dragon’s Blood (©1982)
Heart’s Blood (©1984)
A Sending of Dragons (©1987)

I find out afterward these are “young adult” novels. Okay, shoot me, but they were pretty enjoyable. I’m somewhat at odds with the overall impact of the series – I read them as one long book, which is what you do with an omnibus version – you take the parts as a whole. This leads to good things, and bad depending on whether or not the author can maintain the story arc.

The basic story is quite endearing, and Jane has some great little bits and pieces that really add texture to the story. In a nutshell Austar was a prison planet (Austar, Australia? Tee hee) and the early settlers were divided into two camps – the prisoners, and the keepers. Oh yeah, there are dragons – and they’re bread to fit in pits, but not to the death. Their society is built upon the economy of betting, and upon a class system of bonders and masters. There’s also a Federation, and a group of rebels who want to free Austar from the tyranny of it’s bonder system.

Our young hero Jakkin is an orphaned bonder who manages to steal a baby dragon, train it, and eventually make his way to being a master himself. Of course along the way he falls in love with a young lady who is full of spit and vinegar who just happens to be in league with the rebels. Then there’s killing, hiding, and much eating of berries, while young Jakkin sings the old Spencer Davis Group song “I’m a man” over and over again in an effort to convince his girlfriend he’s all grown up. You get the sense that Jane was putting in place the building blocks for a pretty significant opus. In the first book in particular she does a pretty good job, and the dragon sequences are pretty cool. Of course as the series progresses, less and less really happens that fulfills the early promise of the series. The last book in particular is the odd duck. Left with our hero, his girl friend the entire book is spent learning about an underground society that is never resolved, nor explained. The dragons so colourfully and lovingly woven into the first two books, are just so much peripheral baggage.

If this doesn’t make much sense, it’s pretty much how the series felt to me.

It was a fun read, and it was very enjoyable in places, but in the end it was just a nice way to pass some time, but it could have been something special.

Reviewed February 22, 2005

Captains Outrageous (Or, For Doom the Bell Tolls) (©1994)

You've probably noticed that I like silly books. Silly is hard to do without becoming stupid. This is the first book that Roy wrote, and there's one more out there that I'm looking for.

This is one of those lampoon the fantasy genre books that when done properly is funny and good at the same time. This book is both funny and good. The opening sequence is one of the most memorable scenes I've read in a long time. I was totally suckered. Features a wandering band of good guys who are trying to save the world from an inept magician who has figured out how to end the world. Along the way we meet up with dragons, princes in need of direction, and a hero in search of quality clothing.

If only talent like this was allowed to continue working. There's not a lot of info out there on Mr. Young out there. If he ever finds this page, be assured that there's at least one person looking for more of your stories.

Reviewed March 26, 2001

Yor's Revenge (©1995)

After a year of looking I finally managed to pick up the other book. I found a used bookstore on-line in the states, and it only cost a couple of bucks, plus another ten for shipping, tack on exchange and you have a cheap read.

In the process of looking for the book I managed to make contact with Roy, and we exchanged a couple of pleasant notes, and Roy was gracious enough to send me a copy of his unpublished sequel. Anyway, enough idle chit chat, on with my very important critique of Yor's Revenge.

This time around I had pretty high expectations, and I guess one of the disappointing parts of reading this was knowing that no matter how good this one was, no matter how many unresolved plot twists, this was it, so far as published books went.

There are still a host of bad puns, and fun interplay between the main characters, Yor, Trebor, and Dword. Unlike most comic fantasy, the story is central to the fun, not the other way around. This is actually a pretty robust piece of story telling, and it's sad that this didn't catch. I was trying to figure out why it was taking a while to read, then one night while reading my wife looked over and commented about the font size. No wonder. I'm sure the cover art didn't help sell a lot of books. It's not something to inspire a second look. I know the old saw about not judging a book by it's cover, but something's got to get your attention.

So to Roy, know that you wrote a heck of a story (I read a fair bit, and I know when something's hitting on most of the cylinders), and I'm sure there are a lot of people who were left on the hook wondering what the heck was going to happen next.

Thankfully, I have a chance to peek ahead.

Reviewed July 21, 2002