Childhood Series Take Two I think

Merlin’s Dragon by T.A. Barron (name on the cover)

The Dragon of Avalon by T.T. Barron (name on the internet)

I’m confused. I feel like this is unfair. Now I have to be able to figure out what this book is when a kid says “Well, Merlin was there and there was a dragon on the cover and I think maybe he wasn’t breathing fire” with two different potential titles.

When I was a child I read the Lost Years of Merlin which I thought, at the time, was 5 books. Apparently I was wrong, or they had a spin-off series, which I think was probably how it started, but in a recent move by the publishers to sell more books/confuse me, they merged them.

Feel free to clarify, if I’ve miss read this situation.

So this is the story of a tiny, tiny, tiny little dragon like but not quite dragon creature. He hatches at the birth of Avalon and, after discovering his only apparent talent of creating smells, is called Basil. Basil spends more of his time trying not to get eaten by anything bigger than him, but, through his bravery and curiosity his destiny unfolds and he and Merlin find their fates linked.

I really enjoyed this book. It’s kind of slow and a little wordy, so I’m not sure it’s for all kids, but as a grown up with a slightly longer attention span then a ten year old, I thought the long, windy, nature reverent build up was beautiful.

The best  part was the delightful cast of characters, ranging from Merlin to all the creatures Basil encounters on his quest and the most beautiful descriptions of the natural world and all of the different fantasy worlds Basil explores. The ending might not have been as shocking as I would have liked, but it was definitely lovely, warm and led into the next one.

In conclusion: beautiful for children who like fantasy and strong readers and not looking for anything that moves super fast.

Last movie I watched:

I really don’t know. Frozen maybe? Hope so, ’cause it’s a great movie!

Last TV show I watched:

Angel! Season 3. My favourite!

Nightwing comics that I read ’cause they’re fun

Nightwing New 52 # 0,2,3 5,7 and annual by Tom DeFalco, Kyle Higgins, Eddy Barrows, Eber Ferreira, J R Mayer, Paulo Siqerira, Edwardo Pansica, Jason Masters, Daniel Sampere, Vincente Cifuentes, plus others

So, I’d actually read 5 of these 6 before because they make up the Nightwing: Traps and Trapezes, which is great, and honestly, graphic novels are kind of better. It’s like buying the TV episodes, one per download versus the box set. I like the box set. But I also always want to know what happens next. Anyway, if you’re desperately interested in that story, you should probably go read the other post. It was a great story.

The annual had a tie in with Batgirl, that was super great. Like, loved, loved, loved it. Barbara has to retire Batgirl because she’s wanted for the murder of James Gordon Jr, her own brother and she and Dick spend some quality bonding time together. It’s really beautiful actually, because they’ve been best friends forever and been in and out of love and in a lot of ways are really the best match they’ll ever find for each other. This is complicated because Babs has a boyfriend and Dick is leaving Gotham, and in the end these two things come between them but they do a really good job of showing their relationship and how it’s changed. Also there was some action in there too, but I’m less worried about that.

‘Cause relationships are more important then plot at least half of the time.

Last movie I watched:

Frozen? I think. Whatever. BEST MOVIE EVER.

Last TV episode I watched:

BSG!! Permanent settlement on New Caprica is coming! Let’s all rig elections! Three, prepare yourself for crazy!