Title: Black Powder War
Series: Temeraire #3
Author: Naomi Novik
Genre: Historical Fantasy
Trigger Warnings: Blood, death (severe), animal death (graphic), war, violence, guns, injury, gore, racism (mentions), slavery (mentions), misogyny (mentions)
Spoiler Warning: This book is third in a series, and reading beyond this point will expose you to spoilers of the previous books.
Back Cover:
After their fateful adventure in China, Capt. Will Laurence of His Majesty’s Aerial Corps and his extraordinary dragon, Temeraire, are waylaid by a mysterious envoy bearing urgent new orders from Britain. Three valuable dragon eggs have been purchased from the Ottoman Empire, and Laurence and Temeraire must detour to Istanbul to escort the precious cargo back to England. Time is of the essence if the eggs are to be borne home before hatching. Yet disaster threatens the mission at every turn–thanks to the diabolical machinations of the Chinese dragon Lien, who blames Temeraire for her master’s death and vows to ally herself with Napoleon and take vengeance. Then, faced with shattering betrayal in an unexpected place, Laurence, Temeraire, and their squad must launch a daring offensive. But what chance do they have against the massed forces of Bonaparte’s implacable army?
Review:
I am generally not much for historical fiction, war books, or books that are heavy on politics, and this series is all three. But it also has dragons (and is written by the spectacular Naomi Novik), which I think is why I have stuck with it so far. But I really struggled with this one.
At the end of book two, it seemed like everything was pretty much back to normal. So I naturally assumed the whole book was moderately entertaining but irrelevant to the overall series. I was wrong. First of all, the entirety of this book is taken up with the journey back to England and the mission they did along the way. I didn’t read the back cover and didn’t realize that until the book started and Lawrence and Temeraire were still in China. And second, the experience in China seems to have shifted the entire main plot of the series. I’ll come back to this in a moment.
For the most part, this book was enjoyable. There was plenty of action and adventure and occasional shenanigans. It was fun seeing other parts of a world with dragons, including Istanbul, some other military regiments (Austrian and Prussian if I remember correctly), and some feral dragons. However, some of the challenges Temeraire and company faced felt overly contrived, especially in the beginning. And Black Powder War is so far the heaviest on the war and related politics. I’ll be honest, it got kinda dull in the middle.
Even though this book had a lot more about the war, it feels like the whole focus of the series is changing. Seeing how dragons are treated in China versus England really affected Temeraire, and his driving goal is now dragon equality. He spent most of this book trying to get Lawrence on board. It seems likely to me that this goal will become a driving force, if not the main plot, of later books. And I’m not really sure how I feel about this new direction.
Ultimately, I think I’m going to wait until Lawrence and Temeraire get back to England before I make judgements. This book didn’t have much of the relationship between Lawrence and Temeraire that I loved or any of the fun details of the aerial corps, but they did spend a remarkable amount of time trying to avoid getting killed, so it’s forgivable. I may not be much for historical fiction or war books, but I do love this idea. Considering how awesome so many of the concepts are and how much I have adored Naomi Novik’s other works, I’m disappointed to find that though I like this series, I don’t love it. I’m going to take it one book at a time and see how it goes. Maybe future books will surprise me.
The Temeraire series:
- His Majesty’s Dragon
- Throne of Jade
- Black Powder War
- Empire of Ivory
- Victory of Eagles
- Tongues of Serpents
- Crucible of Gold
- Blood of Tyrants
- League of Dragons
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