Review: Never Deal with Dragons by Lorenda Christensen

Never Deal with Dragons
(DRACIM, #1)
By: Lorenda Christensen
Publisher: Carina Press
Published: July 22, 2013
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Rating:

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Consoling a sobbing dragon and serving pig buffets are just part of the job for Myrna Banks. Working for a mediation firm, it’s her job to get humans compensated for damages caused by the dragons who now rule. But her “typical” day is interrupted by Trian Chobardan, an old flame who sneaked out of her bed two years ago, taking her heart and a handful of classified documents with him.

Myrna would love to show Trian the door, but he’s been sent by North America’s reigning dragon lord for help negotiating a truce with a powerful rival to avert war. Myrna agrees to help, even though she’ll be stuck with Trian as a partner.

As the two work together, Myrna finds Trian to be surprisingly supportive—and still irresistibly attractive. Though her brain tells her not to forget his betrayal, her body feels differently. When they learn the enemy dragon lord is planning something no one could have imagined, Myrna has to learn who she can trust before she loses not only her heart, but her life.

Myrna was demoted at her job when her boyfriend stole important work documents from her home and virtually disappeared from her life. She’s now the assistant to a man who not only hates dragons but can’t dragonspeak, which their job is to mediate problems between dragons and humans. So when her ex, Trian, walks into her place of work, she’d like nothing better than to throw him out on his butt. However, she soon finds herself in the middle of a dragon war and must rely on Trian to keep her alive.

There wasn’t a lot of romance in this story. In fact the majority of it is pretty much urban fantasy with a smidgen of romance at the end. So with that being said, I was a little disappointed that a paranormal romance didn’t have much in the way of romance. However, the story itself was highly entertaining and I found myself enjoying it.

There is a lot of fighting, a ton of dragon action taking place in the story and quite a bit of suspense. I liked that the author didn’t play down the dragons. Instead they took front and center in the story. Their scaly hides were always present. She showed how they viewed humans as no more than slaves and she even wrote a particular disturbing scene with a terrified goat and his last minutes of life before being eaten by a dragon.

One of the big shockers in the book did not come as a surprise to me. In fact, from the beginning I knew what it was, and was a little disappointed when it was revealed that everyone made such a big deal about it… and yet no one figured it out. I always hate when I know the big secret before I’m even fully immersed in the book.

Regardless of my issues with the book, I did find it entertaining. I liked the suspense and fighting in the book. I like that the author didn’t make dragons vegetarians or make them humanized in the eyes of the reader. They are predators and she wrote them as such. This is a good book for someone who is interested in reading an urban fantasy about dragons.

“I was beginning to worry I’d have a heart attack combining exercise with sexual attraction.”