Family friendly ‘Heroes’ fantasy

Having enjoyed ‘Of Children and Dragons’, the first book in the series, I was keen to embark on the continuation of the journey in ‘Of Wizards and Dragons: A Tale of Heroes Book Two’. If, for some reason, you come to this second book first, it does contain a handy summary of the first book before the second instalment commences but I really do recommend starting with the first book. The summary does act as a useful recap for those that have read the first book some time before coming to the second one.

These books have grown out of a family environment fantasy role-playing game where you roll dice and build characters and adventures. As a result, the story is definitely suitable for younger readers but can be enjoyed at any age. Mark Hansen started writing a story blog based in the world, and on the rules and characters created in the game and those blogs have since been collected together and produced as the books in this series. The books reflect the fact that the story began as a series of blogs. Consequently, each chapter is only a few pages long and focuses on one character’s perspective. Approximately every twelve scenes are ‘bundled up’ into a ‘part’, and the parts are grouped into story arcs. These bite-sized chapters are definitely ideal for younger readers if they are starting reading these books at around 10 years of age.

There is an interesting mix of quite different characters with diverse agendas who have come together. Their journey includes learning about cooperation and teamwork, choices and consequences, lessons about right and wrong, good and evil, how things are not always as they seem, that friendships can have a lot of ups and downs and how prejudices and misunderstandings can get in the way of an awful lot of things. I loved the second book as much as the first. I wonder what will happen with the next book as there are plenty more rolls of the dice!

Andrew McDermott does another marvellous job with the narration. An easy and enjoyable listen. Great anytime, particularly for car journeys - and for bedtime story-time instalments since you can set an Audible sleep timer.

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