The Smoke Dragon by Shane Jiraiya Cummings

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


This book was free from Barnes and Noble on 2-23-2011, and it is still free a year later. A nice thing about Free Fridays is the opportunity to try a book from a genre I don't ususally choose.

This book is a 75-page story/novella which introduces the reader to Kaidan, Akio and Yumi who will appear in future novels, yet to be published by the names mentioned. A first chapter of one of these is included.

The setting may be "in a Japan that never was" but the author does a good job of evoking a mood with his storytelling. One thing I did not like was the specifying of incantations or mantras without working an explanation into the story for my curiosity took me out of the fictive dream several times in these few pages.

If you like Dark Horse Comics' Usagi Yohimbo, this may be a book you would like.


View all my reviews