i really like what she's doing with her overall discussion of what makes a hero, and it's becoming more clear that heroism is both not about brute force and also potentially a burden. this seems to be heading to the critical juncture and i suspect that another main point she is going to get to might be that the hero can't always win or save everyone. i really liked seeing hiccup's mother, valhallarama, come to his defense in this one. ( )

The Dragon Rebellion has begun and Hiccup must find the Dragon's Jewel in order to save his people. Another fun installment in the series, wonderfully read by David Tennant. ( )

This is the one where all the Vikings of Berk are slaves to Alvin the Treacherous, and they have to search for the Dragon Jewel like doomed cockle pickers. We finally find out what happened to Fishlegs when he was a baby, and he discovers that a Deadly Shadow dragon will protect him come what may. And Hiccup relationship with his mother. In the earlier books she has been 'absent, questing', whereas now things take a turn for the worse when she kidnaps him, and deliver him to his worst enemies. But in the end, she has faith in him, and persuades the nicer half of the vikings to take the slavemark as the dragonmark and return to his side. ( )

My blog post about this book is at this link. ( )

http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/2084956.html

the middle book of a climactic sequence in which villains from previous volumes have come together and enslaved Hiccup's village, while plotting magical domination of the known world (or at least the Viking archipelago). The is a fairly spectacular set of scenes around a geographically improbable desert, and Hiccup must deal separately with mummy and daddy issues. I did not feel the urge to seek out any more in the series to see how it ends ( )