Book Review: A Dragon's Chains: Book One of the Remembered War by Robert Vane
The story is about slavery which is a topic if not done right, can go very badly. The main character, Bayloo is a mind slave dragon for the humans. He breaks free from his mind control after drinking ale and tries to free other mind slave dragons. Sounds good. The problem comes from the fact that the slaver (Bayloo) becomes the master. I’ll try not to include spoilers but whenever a story features a slave, and they get an opportunity to become a master, that’s bad. Even if it’s with “good intentions” or that he felt “sorrow” shortly after. The fact he enjoyed it at all, is the problem.
Slavery is seen as one of the worst things anyone can do. Especially mind slavers because at that point they're basically zombies. To have Bayloo, who was a mind slave, end up controlling a human and turning them into a mind slave as well as enjoying this newfound power was probably one of the worst things he could do.
I’m all for slavers getting revenge on their masters. I’m not in favour of a slaver who becomes their master but with “heart”.
For a better example of the trope, I recommend checking out Baldur's Gate Three, in particular the Astarion story arc. In his story, he’s a slave to his master and gets the opportunity to kill his master and take his power. This is the evil option. Bayloo should never have taken control of a human because it ruined any goodwill he might’ve had throughout the story. Also, he did all of this to free a mind slave dragon and failed in the process so what’s the point?
That’s another thing I would like to talk about, Bayloo just kind of sucks. Not talking about being as a character but he fails all the time. He fails to protect a dragon, fails to rescue another dragon, and fails in trying to free a mind-slave dragon. He gets his own ryder killed within the first few chapters, and it’s told that was his fifth one. And even if he wasn’t responsible for another dragon's death, he was near them, fought alongside them, and they still died. When he’s told he’s cursed, I believe it.
But I asked again, what’s the point? What was the point of the story? The only thing which happens is that Bayloo breaks free from his mind control in Chapter 1 fails throughout the story and kind of just leaves for Book 2. Now I’ve been told the story picks up in book two however this isn’t a review for book 2 and as of right now, I don’t have any intentions to pick up the second book after the nothingness that was book 1.
Despite my harsh review, I’m not filled with hate, I do think this story had potential but it desperately needed a sensitivity reader. One that specialised in slavery. I’m all for a story about a slave who breaks free from their master and seeks revenge but it needs to be done with care. Slavery is still around today, so it’s a topic that needs to be handled carefully and with experts on the field going over what you wrote. This book does have other problems besides slavery such as all of the side characters being useless. Entire chapters were info dumps and to each their own, but I didn’t find the several fart or piss jokes funny.
It might seem with the slavery aspect my one gripe was that Bayloo ended up controlling someone, however, it’s not just that one issue, but the one that stood out compared to the rest. Throughout the entire story, I got an uncomfortable feeling. One of those uncomfortable feelings was when Bayloo tried to save his master within the first few chapters of the story even though he'd broken free from his mind control and could've just flew away when he had the opportunity. It read to me as “This master was kinder than the rest so I should try and save his life despite he was controlling my free will”. While that plot point was explained, it came late in the story.
Even when the plot twist of his ryder, Jona got revealed, I didn’t care. Jona spoke maybe three times throughout the story, his plot twist meant nothing because I never cared about him. The only other character I cared for was Bethy and it’s because it’s revealed she’s an ally early on.
If you’re gonna write a story and have the main theme be about slavery it’s important to get a sensitivity reader. I understand many writers have been writing for decades and I don’t doubt anyone's skills when it comes to writing, but there’s no harm in having someone check over your work to see if you’re on the right track. Even scientists who are experts in their fields need their research papers to be peer-reviewed.
But don’t just take my word on this review, make sure to check out what others had to say about it and if you read it I'm curious what your thoughts were?
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