This Christmas one of the presents the boys received from their Aunt, Uncle, and little cousin was Dragon Rider, by Cornelia Funke.  We had never heard of the book, but I added it to our reading pile to start after we finished the second Harry Potter. Well, we just finished Dragon Rider last night and this story is now one of my favorites.

The story is one which will appeal to kids big and small.  A hidden group of dragons learns that humans are coming and they will be discovered.  Only one of them is brave enough to leave their hiding place and search for their ancestral home. He brings along his faithful brownie and along the way befriends a human boy who becomes his Dragon Rider.  The story is filled with numerous creatures and adventures and every night the boys would chorus the same thing: “ONE more chapter dad, PLEASE!”

The book is very long, which in this case is a good thing.  We had a blast reading it and I frequently gave them their “one more chapter” because I, too, was dying to find out what happened next.  There is a wonderful blend of adventure, fantasy, friendship, and humor.  As soon as I finished the book last night Ben immediately asked if we could read it again.

If you go in search of Dragon Rider, I highly recommend the hard cover version.  The cover art is gorgeous and it contains many sketches which the boys loved studying with me.  The best part is that there is no cover sleeve!  Something I loathe in a children’s book because it always comes off and gets crumpled.

The timing of our read was also unintentionally well planned.  Dreamworks is releasing How To Train Your Dragon later this month and the boys can’t wait to see it.  If your kids become dragon obsessed after seeing the movie, Dragon Rider would be a great book to read with them.  While there is no Dragon Rider movie, there is an audio version on Audible.com read by Brendan Fraser.

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