The story of Jowen Thornsen, from a privileged dragon riding family on the island of Arcosi, who desperately wants a dragon of his own to bond with him...

This book is fast paced and easy to read, and would suit readers in early secondary school. Jowen starts as a spoiled rich kid, who reacts very angrily to disappointment when he is not selected by the dragons. But he grows as a character, and learns how to use his anger more wisely without being controlled by it. Of course, this is helped by him discovering his own super-special Shadow Dragon, so the moral is less 'don't be disappointed when life doesn't act like you're the chosen one', and more 'don't be disappointed, you'll probably end up being an even-more-chosen one in the end.' But he works hard, openly asks for forgiveness, and manages to remember the humanity even of his enemies.

The plot with the Norlander Brotherhood is interesting. The book runs with quite a straight anti-fascist 'it is wrong of them to want to kick other people off their island, our strength is in our diversity, and we should unite people by celebrating our differences together.' But actually, as far as I could glean (I should read the first book in the series) it was historically their island, and then the immigrants with dragons came with vastly superior technology (dragons!) and took all the positions of power, and made lots of their industries and their men redundant. It was interesting to have sympathetic bad guys.

Winter is clearly the most interesting character - her dragon died in a plague when she was about 12, and since then she has been lurking in tunnels lost in her grief, but risks coming back to humanity to save Jowen and rebond with a shadow dragon of her own.

Also, dragons and volcanos are cool. ( )