How to Train your Dragon - Cressida Cowell

.../> ***Interesting Trivia*** (Taken from How to speak Dragonese)
The rights to the Horrible Horrendous the Third Series have been bought by Dreamworks Animation, the creators of Shrek with the view to releasing the first of the three films , How to Train your Dragon in 2009.

***About the author***(Taken from How to Speak Dragonese)
As a relatively new addition to the world of successful Children's books authors, there ...
...other Hiccup the Horrendous Books, How to Train your Dragon and How to Speak Dragonese

***Who is Hiccup Horrendous?***
This is the first book in the series and where we meet Hiccups companion Toothless

Hiccup, son and Heir to the Chief of the Hairy Hooligan Vikings. is a student at the local Viking school where he does not excel. His father Stoick is constantly disappointed by his son's disinterest and inability ... more

*As this is one book in a series of 3 that I am reviewing, there will be some doubling up on info relating to the whole series and the author.

I picked three of the Hiccup Horrendous series books up one day as I struggled to find something that would appeal to my Step-son. Now 10 years old, he doesn't read often but since he was four I have read to him every night he spends with us and this continues today. The intention was to find books that he would connect with and be interested in enough to read himself. Unfortunately, he is fixated on WWF at the moment so doesn't get too excited about anything else. Having said that, I read all three books within a week and could happily read them all over again!

Author/Illustrator: Cressida Cowell
Publisher: Hodder Children's Books
Publish Date:
Genre: Children's adventure
Age Suitability: 7 - 11 year olds (probably mostly for boys)
RRP: £5.99 Amazon Price: £4.79
Available from most major book stores (Waterstones, Chapters, Borders, WHS etc)

***Interesting Trivia*** (Taken from How to speak Dragonese)
The rights to the Horrible Horrendous the Third Series have been bought by Dreamworks Animation, the creators of Shrek with the view to releasing the first of the three films , How to Train your Dragon in 2009.

***About the author***(Taken from How to Speak Dragonese)
As a relatively new addition to the world of successful Children's books authors, there isn't a lot known about Cowell.

Before establishing herself as a highly successful author, Cressida worked as an illustrator and was short-listed for the Macmillan Prize for Illustration, and indeed, she provides the limited illustrations throughout this book as well as doing the cover artwork.

She lives in London with her husband and their young daughter

Other books by Cressida Cowell include picture books, Daddy on the Moon, What shall we do Boo Baby, What shall we do with the Boo Hoo Baby and the other Hiccup the Horrendous Books, How to Train your Dragon and How to Speak Dragonese

***Who is Hiccup Horrendous?***
This is the first book in the series and where we meet Hiccups companion Toothless

Hiccup, son and Heir to the Chief of the Hairy Hooligan Vikings. is a student at the local Viking school where he does not excel. His father Stoick is constantly disappointed by his son's disinterest and inability to be a great Warrior who will follow in his footsteps some day.

Hiccup is small for his age, not particularly strong, not very good at bullying and definitely not good at shouting. Instead, Hiccup, a thinker amongst fighters spends most of his days just trying to survive and keep his head, and that of his even weedier friend Fishlegs above water.

Hiccup is bright and prefers to approach problems with a sensible manner using his problem-solving skills. This goes down like a led balloon with a town full of people who prefer the "bash first - think later approach." It particularly doesn't go down well with his cousin and classmate Snotlout or his sidekick Dogsbreath the Duhbrain. Snotlout, the nephew of the Chief is positive he deserves to be the heir not Hiccup because he can fight, insult and be generally rude with the best of them. It is Snotlout that Hiccup spends most of his time battling with.

***What's How to Train your Dragon all about?***
In order to graduate into full members of the Hairy Hooligan Tribe, All the students at the local Viking school must first catch and then train their dragon to compete against each other in a end of year battle.

For some reason that neither Hiccup nor his classmates can understand, their teacher Gobber the Belch decides to put Hiccup in charge of this, their first military operation.

"SILENCE!" roared Gobber the Belch. "The next boy to speak has limpets for lunch for the next THREE WEEKS!"
There was absolute silence immediately. Limpets are a bit like worms and a bit like snot and a lot less tasty than either." Excerpt taken as Gobber's response to Hiccups classmates complaining about him being put in charge.
Each boy wanted to catch a 'top of the line' dragon. Monstrous Nightmares were considered the fiercest, and most powerful fighters and hunters. Being the Heir to the Chief it was expected that Hiccup should be the only person to catch a Monstrous Nightmare as a symbol of his pending greatness. The problem was he and his fellow students, each had to creep into the dragon nursery, deep inside a dark cave aptly named Wild Dragon Cave while the dragons slept for the last few weeks of hibernation. God forbid, they woke up any of the creatures!
As is always the case with hiccup, disaster strikes in the form of his hapless friend Fishlegs and they are forced to flee in fear of their lives. Being a good friend, Hiccup gives his dragonless friend Fishlegs the dragon he had caught as to return empty-handed would mean an instant fail and the shame of all or the village of Berk. Hiccup then grabbed the first dragon he felt and ran to safety. It was only when he got outside that he looked into his basket and realised he had caught the most useless, scrawniest, tiniest of "garden dragons." But then, we wouldn't expect anything else from dear old Hiccup.
Equally predictably, Snotlout does manage to capture a Monstrous Nightmare and gloats openly about having won the end of year battle before it has even began.
Over the next few weeks, Hiccup tries desperately to train his toothless friend but it proves to be more of a challenge that he had counted on. Toothless, is a stubborn and stroppy dragon who doesn't like to exert too much energy doing anything. She doesn't see the point in hunting when she could curl up by the fire and wait for Hiccup to feed her. She also hates the rain, which is the standard weather on the dreary Isle of Berk.

It is the common belief that shouting loudly at your dragon is the only true way of training a dragon, but as shouting is not one of Hiccups strong points he is forced to try bribery and spoiling his dragon neither of which work with any particular amount of success.

As the day of the battle looms closer, Hiccup has all but given up on any chance of beating Snotlout's horribly Monstrous Nightmare.

But just as the e battle begins the town is struck down in horror at the site of two ferocious looking beasts washed up on shore. A town meeting is called and it agreed the beasts are far too big to shout at so Hiccup who speaks Dragonese is elected as the one who will go to find out what the creatures are doing here.
Will Hiccup save the day? Will the notoriously disloyal dragons decide to leave the island or will they rally around to help poor Hiccup out in his hour of need? If you want to know, READ THE BOOK!

Like all of the Hiccup Horrendous series, there is fighting, mystery, gastly creatures of all kinds and again, near death experiences aplenty.

***Illustrations***
As with How to Speak Dragonese and How to be a Pirate, Cressida Cowell introduces us to her hideous characters through a variety of basic sketches throughout the story. The drawings are not fancy or elaborate but are funny and lend themselves well to developing the readers' sense of who the characters are. She is obviously well placed to draw the characters as no one will have a better understanding of who they are than she does, although her descriptive writing style is enough on its own to give the reader a great mental picture of the people and beasts they are reading about.

***Opinion of the story***
I am constantly amazed by the level of imagination Cowell includes in her tales. Like the others. This is such an exciting book it is almost impossible to put down. There is endless excitement and amazing adventures which the reader travels through along with Hiccup and his sulky dragon. The characters are described so vividly, I as a reader found myself genuinely concerned for their safety, and equally excited for Hiccups triumphs.

It is my opinion that given the proper amount of attention, these books could easily rival the stories of Harry Potter and certainly with Harry's imminent demise Hiccup could step up to the plate to take over the torch of Pre-teen (ok and adult) hero.

 

...less