The Dragons of Deepwood Fen

 By: Bradley P. Beaulieu

Location: FIC BEA

Genre: Fantasy, Dragons, Epic Fantasy

The Dragons of Deepwood Fen is the superb new high fantasy series by Bradley P Beaulieu. This is a classic tale of the thirst for power, of rising up from oppression and of a race to save the world, all done with a fantastic draconian twist.

Lorelei Aurelius is the smartest inquisitor in the mountain city of Ancris. When a mysterious tip leads her to a clandestine meeting between the Church and the hated Red Knives, she uncovers a plot that threatens not only her home but the empire itself.

The trail leads to Rylan Holbrooke, a notorious thief posing as a dragon singer. Lorelei soon discovers there's more to Rylan than meets the eye. He came to Ancris to solve the very same mystery she stumbled onto. Knowing his incarceration could lead to the Red Knives' achieving their goals, Lorelei makes a fateful decision: she frees him.

Now branded as traitors, the two flee the city on dragonback. In the massive forest known as the Holt, they follow the trail of clues and discover something terrible. The Red Knives are planning to awaken a powerful demi-god in the holiest shrine in Ancris, and for some reason the Church is willing to allow it. It forces their return to Ancris, where the unlikely allies must rally the very people who've vowed to capture them before it's too late.

The Dragons of Deepwood Fen has a great synopsis that I’m not going to rewrite here. All that matters is dragons. Title says everything you need. Dragons.

This is book 1 of a trilogy, and let me tell you that I cannot wait for book 2. There is just so much to love in this book. We start off with a bang. All sorts of mystery, little bit of murder, hints of the magic to come, and I was sold. Then we jump in with the dragons, and anyways, this book owns my heart now.

This is a typical big ol’ fantasy book, where we’re thrown a lot of characters, different chapters give different points of view, all the usual stuff most readers have seen in these types of books. Beaulieu managed something unusual though, because usually there’s a point of view the reader doesn’t care for. They read the chapters to get to the good chapters, with the characters they like. For myself at least, this book didn’t have that. I liked reading all of the perspectives, I liked reading all of the characters. That’s not to say I liked the character themselves, but I didn’t need to rush to get to my favourites because each point of view was doing something that kept me interested. I definitely still had my favourites, but there was so much political intrigue and different factors in the story that each chapter added a little more to the mystery and solving the mystery of what was going on.

This was my first read by Beaulieu, and it’s definitely made me need to read others. The writing was a great balance of straightforward while still being descriptive and beautiful without being overly flowery. It flowed really nicely, and the writing made the book feel shorter than it was because it was just so easy to fall into the story and fly through it. I also appreciated that the writing managed to have good humour peppered throughout the story and dialogue without feeling forced.

Deepwood Fen really does have a bit of something for everyone. Political intrigue, church and religious intrigue, action, unique magic systems, reincarnation, bonded dragons, dragons in servitude, murder, good banter between characters. It has everything. I can’t recommend it enough, I think all fantasy readers are going to enjoy this. Caitlin