Hurog means dragon

[jmc_bks]

Hurog means dragon.

What is Hurog? It is the name of a place and a people born from Patricia Briggs’ imagination and described in her books Dragon Bones and Dragon Blood. Once dragons lived in the Northlands and the Empire ruled. Hurog was where dragons flew, slaves found refuge, and dwarvenkind came to trade. But the Empire fell, leaving behind only scattered holdings, and the dwarves sickened. Dragons are long gone by the time of Wardwick of Hurog. The half-witted son of the Lord of Hurog, Ward becomes the Hurogmeten, Guardian of Dragons (only a traditional title now), upon his father’s death. He inherits a dying holding set in the mountains, peopled by the fragments of his family – demented mother, runaway brother, mute sister, troublemaking cousins, perhaps powerhungry uncle – and the family ghost, Oreg. A heavy burden for an idiot.

Despite the poverty of the holding, the ancient keep holds some secrets that make it desirable...and powerful, in the right hands. But the keep isn’t the only thing hiding secrets; Ward is, too – he isn’t as stupid as everyone thinks. The treasure hidden in the keep and the power hidden in both Ward and Oreg are the flash points for political, military and magical intrigue.

Briggs does a fabulous job with this duology. I was totally sucked in, from the first page. I finished Dragon Bones and had to immediately purchase a copy of Dragon Blood to see what happened next. Each book stands on its own – no cliffhanger endings – I was just impatient to know what was next in the future of Ward and Oreg. Objectively speaking, there were some anachronisms and a couple of small continuity problems, but the world building and the characters were so well-drawn that I can overlook the small flaws. Ward is a fantastic hero – he’s smart and brave, but also pragmatic and political. He takes his job as Hurogmeten seriously – he’s tied to the land but he is also the caretaker of its people, and he shows it in lots of little ways and big ways. Oreg is a fascinating character, one who I’d like to see more of – I’d especially like to get his POV, but Briggs sticks mostly to Ward’s, with a small scattering of others. Dragon Blood has a sweet romance as a secondary part of the story – the main focus is always the adventure, though.

Briggs has mentioned on her blog that there’s a third Hurog book lurking in her imagination, and I’d love to read it. But I’m guessing that the Mercy Thompson and Alpha & Omega books are taking priority for the time being. 

Comments

Meme

[(Anonymous)]

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Ana

http://thebooksmugglers.blogspot.com

[hzuki.livejournal.com]

Woah seriously? A third book would be so awesome though if there hasn't been any more news of it by now the hopes for it seem low. On another note, while scouring the internet for anything that was related the the Hurog duology I found your blog! So now random stalkerish thing ^^;

[jmc-bks.livejournal.com]

The mention on her blog was old, at least a couple of years, so I'm guessing that any third Hurog book is not high on the "to write" list.

[limbosplaything.livejournal.com]

ah, she has so many projects with the mercy thompson series... and she's under contract for those... hopefully she will get to write it! but since the mercy series is 'more popular' now, it may be quite a while...