Book Review: I’m Afraid You’ve Got Dragons by Peter S Beagle

Peter S. Beagle is one of my favourite authors and at eighty-five years old has published a new fantasy novel called I’m Afraid You’ve Got Dragons. I enjoyed his two short story collections published last year, Lila the Werewolf and Other Stories, and Oakland Dragon Blues and Other Stories. If you’ve been following my blog for a while you’ll know The Last Unicorn is one of my all-time favourite books. I can’t help but wonder if one of the dragons in this story is the same one mentioned in The Last Unicorn.

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About The Book 📚

Title: I’m Afraid You’ve Got Dragons

Author: Peter S. Beagle

Publication Date: May 14, 2024

Publisher: Simon & Schuster, Saga Press

Genre: Young Adult, Satire, High Fantasy, Action & Adventure

Pages: 278

About The Author

“PETER S. BEAGLE – Noted author and screenwriter Peter Beagle is a recipient of the prestigious Hugo, Nebula, Locus, and Mythopoeic Awards, and a World Fantasy and Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America 2018 Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master, among other literary achievements.

He has given generations of readers the magic of unicorns, haunted cemeteries, lascivious trees and disgruntled gods. A prolific author, his best-known work is The Last Unicorn, a fantasy novel, which Locus Magazine subscribers voted the number five “All-Time Best Fantasy Novel” in 1987. Fellow Hugo and Nebula-award-winning author Neil Gaiman has described Beagle’s A Fine and Private Place as his “I-wish-I’d-written-that first novel.”

In October 2020, The Last Unicorn was included in TIME’s “100 Best Fantasy Books of All Time,” a group of books that was compiled together with a panel of leading fantasy authors—N.K. Jemisin, Neil Gaiman, Sabaa Tahir, Tomi Adeyemi, Diana Gabaldon, George R.R. Martin, Cassandra Clare and Marlon James. TIME describes these books as “the most engaging, inventive and influential works of fantasy fiction, in chronological order beginning in the 9th century.” https://beaglev e rse.com/about/

My Review

› I’m Afraid You’ve Got Dragons was first announced in 2007 and has overcome many obstacles (legal battle with a former manager who was found guilty of financial elder abuse, fraud, breach of fiduciary duty, and defamation) to get here, and it was worth the wait. Some websites are still under the control of his former manager, therefore the best place to get information about Beagle is from Beagleverse. https://beagleverse.com/

› The cover for I’m Afraid You’ve Got Dragons is everything I want for a fantasy novel. Dragons of all shapes and sizes, a castle, beautiful colours, and a cool font.

› Prologue: “The warning came in the form of a great wind, sudden and cold, sweeping out of the western mountains on a perfectly bland and cloudless summer day.”

Chapter One – First Line: “Robert dreamed…It was The Dream – the one that visited him so often that it had long since lost any terrifying aspect and become as drearily predictable as the ones in which he was being driven out of town by a herring, laughing mob, or found himself suddenly naked and pink as a shrimp while kneeling to court Violette-Elisabeth, the baker’s daughter. Even so, The Dream left him feeling strangely thrilled…”

› Eighteen-year-old Gaius Aurelius Constantine Heliogabalus prefers to be called Robert. He inherited his
deceased father’s job as a dragon exterminator. There’s just one problem – Robert likes dragons and doesn’t want to kill them. He even has dragons as pets.

› In a place where the nobility are uneducated, Princess Cerise is determined to teach herself how to read. One day, while reading in the forest, Cerise meets Prince Reginald of Corvinia. Cerise’s home, Castle Bellemontagne, is infested with dragons. Her father, King Antoine, hires Robert to get rid of the dragons as soon as possible because they want to impress Prince Reginald.

Prince Reginald appears to be a handsome hero, however, in his father’s eyes he’s a coward. King Krije orders Reginald to go out into the world and prove himself a hero before he can become King. The thing is, Reginald doesn’t want to be King. After Robert successfully rids the castle of the dragons, Prince Reginald’s valet, Mortmain, makes a deal with Robert to help Reginald find and kill a dragon and in return, Mortmain will teach Robert how to be a prince’s valet. This would allow Robert to leave his kingdom and not have to be known as the dragon exterminator.

On their dragon-hunting journey Robert, Cerise, and Reginald are attacked by a trio of enormous dragons and they discover a much larger problem threatening the entire kingdom. And so, a reluctant dragon slayer, a reluctant princess, and a reluctant prince are forced to team up and save the world.

› Beagle achieves amazing character development, but I wanted to know more about the villain’s backstory and motivation. I loved the descriptions and world-building. Beagle’s writing style is flawless. Although the ending is anti-climactic, it is a page-turner with real conflict. There are thought-provoking themes around class. I thought it was unique to have a dragon-slayer’s job be considered middle class and the nobility are uneducated and don’t know how to read or write. It was strange how some of the side characters weren’t mentioned for large chunks of time. Despite my few nit-picks, I had a good time reading I’m Afraid You’ve Got Dragons.

› In the past I have given a rating out of ten and converted that to a star rating, but I’m no longer giving a star rating here on my blog. I will continue to do that on Goodreads and The Story Graph.

› Final Thoughts
• Yes, I’m Afraid You’ve Got Dragons is action-packed, whimsical and funny, but it’s also as dark as the Brother Grimm fairy tales. Like the stories they collected, this book by Peter S. Beagle is absurd, engaging, and tragic. This is an emotional story with great prose about parental expectations, ambition, fate, courage, friendship, and discovering who you want to be. I recommend this to fans of the Lord of the Rings, The Wheel of Time, and Thornhedge.