The latest book releases for curious minds

DRAGON WORLD

THESE FIRE-BREATHING BEASTS HAVE MUCH KNOWLEDGE TO IMPART

AUTHOR TAMARA MACFARLANE

ILLUSTRATOR ALESSANDRA FUSI

PUBLISHER DK CHILDREN

PRICE £9.99 / $17.99

RELEASE OUT NOW

Dragons were popular long before Daenerys Targaryen mounted Drogon in Game of Thrones and turned the Lannister supply lines into strips of bubbling metal and ash; long before How to Train Your Dragon inspired a generation of kids to dress puppies in wing costumes, before Pete’s Dragon gave imaginary friends scales and fangs and even before Tolkien made them the supremely intelligent beings of high fantasy that we’re familiar with today. Under the banner of quality illustrated reads that is DK, author Tamara MacFarlane has written a book about dragons that’s guaranteed to capture the imagination of any child.

A book about dragons that’s guaranteed to capture the imagination of any child

The focus of Dragon World is on real dragon mythology from almost every civilisation that features these fantastic creatures. Much of Asian culture is steeped in dragon legends, so there’s a good third or so of this 80-page book that’s dedicated to exploring dragon tales from Japan, China and India, describing famous named dragons like Naga and Orochi. European dragons also have a large and dedicated section, with stories such as Y Ddraig Goch – how the Welsh flag came by its unique red dragon emblem. The rest of the world is a little more sparse in its dragon mythology, although there are distinctive stories from Australia and the tribespeople of the Arctic Circle. The pleasantly surprising part of Dragon World comes at the end with Dragon Discoveries, which dresses up science and nature as fun fantasy fiction. Readers will learn about ‘dragon jewels’ - precious and semiprecious stones, where dragons live within layers of the Earth, living dragons, which are animals named after dragons, and even dragon science – animals with dragon-like abilities explained.