cover image The Book of Dragons

The Book of Dragons

Michael Hague. HarperCollins, $21.99 (160pp) ISBN 978-0-688-10879-3

Take one first-rate collection of fire-breathing, scale-flashing, wing-flapping, tail-lashing dragon yarns. Lace it with elegant black-and-white line drawings and a generous dollop of unabashedly romantic color plates awash with vibrant hues. The result? A deliciously old-fashioned storybook, delivering just the sort of fantasy Hague is best known for. He pulls out all the stops for this one, using watercolors to present a diverse assortment of winged beasts. There are green dragons, red dragons, multi-headed dragons, even dragons that hint of the Orient with their long beards and manes. The stories-from such luminaries as Kenneth Grahame, J.R.R. Tolkien, E. Nesbit, Elizabeth Coatsworth and C.S. Lewis-are equally splendid. All ages. (Sept.)