Monday, September 28, 2009

Beast Quest - Ferno, The Fire Dragon


Beast Quest - Ferno, The Fire Dragon


Author : Adam Blade


Cover Illustrator : David Wyatt


Reading level : Read Alone Age 6- 9 years


It was my 7 year old's excitement and enthusiasm to finish this book that prompted me to immediately put up a review here.


May be I can give a little background here. Sometime last year when I was checking with Praba about books that can be introduced to my son, she mentioned the Magic Treehouse series. They are the first chapter books which he got to read. The simple easy language of the books attracted him and also there was the whole thrill of finishing chapter by chapter of the adventures undertaken by Jack and Annie of the series. After a few books the excitement wore off and there was a dry reading spell.


Then by chance Sooraj discovered this "Beast Quest" book while browsing at the bookshop with his father. It is also a chapter book. The picture of the dragon (which has always held a charm for him) on the book cover was enough to attract him towards it. It is a story of a young boy who is sent on a mission to free some beasts from an evil spell, to save the kingdom. This is the first book in this series where in he has to free the dragon from the spell, while fighting all the
challenges that come his way. For a young boy like Sooraj, this book has all the necessary fantasy ingredients to keep him glued to it. The language is lucid (with a little help
for some words and their meanings) and the print is bold, making it a fewer words on each page. It has around 110 pages. He thoroughly enjoyed the book and finished it in two days.


His enthusiasm level was so high that he asked his father to draw a picture of the dragon from the book and then patiently coloured it with his own choice of colours :-). He is now rearing to get hold of the next book in the series !


When I did a search on the author Adam Blade, I got conflicting information. Some websites say that it is a pseudonym for a team of writers. Some others give a basic profile of him saying he is from UK.


I think this series would primarily interest those children who love fantasies and have started reading by themselves.

6 comments:

Praba Ram said...

sounds perfect! "dry reading spell" - Love the way you put it!!

I guess, you and Sathish must be quite thrilled about Sooraj's new-found interest in fantasy! Great! Were there any terrifying/frightening parts?

Sheela said...

Hold on, wait a second, Ranjani... are you telling me Satish drew that Dragon colored in by Sooraj - purple and spitting yellow-orange fire?!

Amazing! Perhaps Satish and Sooraj should team up and delight us with their very own illustrated story books soon.

Sooraj has a new friend now - moi! See, Ana and I are fascinated by dragons as well! When she was little and her Dad would give her a ride on his back, he was no ordinary "horsie" or "elephant", he was the Dragon that she was riding - skywards :)

ranjani.sathish said...

Hi Praba
Yeah we are thrilled that he is finding something exciting to read again ! No there were no terrifying parts. Even in the end, he does not have to slay the dragon. He has to just unlock a collar which frees the dragon from the evil spell and makes him good again :-)

Hi Sheela
Thanks for your comment. Showed it to Sooraj and he felt very happy !

Wow ..so Ana likes dragons too. Both these kids must have inherited their love for dragons from their parents (Sooraj from Sathish and Ana from you !!)

Praba Ram said...

seriously, the dragon picture is something! I didnt look at it carefully until ofcourse Sheela's comment came up.
So, you guys have an in-house artist whos good at make-your-own-coloring-books, I guess...

May be you should consider putting up some scanned b/w images that we can print and give our little ones for coloring instead of say some full of disney characters coloring books!
and particularly, I think there will be interest in Indian themed ones and even regional ones...

Tharini said...

Ranjani, you won't believe it! Thanks to ST's tips some time back on self reading, I too got the Magic Treehouse books home and Winkie is seriously hooked!! He's gobl;ling them up by the hour, for the very same reasons you mentioned. The fact that these are easy to read and easy to finish chapter sizes and exciting adventures!! And he's gotten started on the Beast Quest series too! i never thought I'd see him lounging on the couch reading! Its thrilling. I can feel how you feel when you do this review! :D

ranjani.sathish said...

Tharini I feel so happy to hear your feedback ! This motivates me even further to keep sharing Sooraj's reading journey with you all :-)

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