Reviews

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5/5 stars “This is a wonderful story for all fantasy and adventure lovers. Welcome to a unique land where people are identified by their eye color. The peace loving heroine risks her life to keep Quanx from war. The involvement of the Dragon Tribes is creative and exciting. It is a real page turner that kept me guessing the outcome all the way to the end. And once I got there I was so sorry the story ended. The title implies a trilogy so to my relief there will be more coming. This is a great holiday gift that is sure to fire up the imagination of young teens through adults.” –Karen Galvin

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5/5 stars “Becca Mann is an expert at building suspense! I read this book with my young teenage daughter. She could not wait to continue and I was right along there with her! The plot is incredibly clever and unexpected! There are so many plot twists! There is heart break along with the suspense but the grief is handled expertly. Don’t worry I wont spoil it by saying how. Nothing you think will happen – does happen. You really want those kids to steal the egg … but in order to do so, friendships must be won & lost, heartbreak endured, adventures that will cause you to keep turning pages, plot twist you’d never dream of, battles, bravery & murder. You will wonder if Sawyer is good or bad? What happens to Velvet and Tyler? What will the dragon become and what of Paka and Kale? Like me & my daughter, you will anxiously await the next book!” –Yajaira Aguilar

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“The Stolen Dragon of Quanx” is the first novel in (The Eyes Trilogy) by: Becca Mann.  After finishing  “The Stolen Dragon of Quanx,” you will be begging for it’s sequel!

Becca Mann is the author of “The Stolen Dragon of Quanx,” and what is so amazing about this young author is, her age- she’s only a teenager! She currently writes teenage children’s and young adult fiction fantasy. Becca has traveled and written in six of the seven continents, and also swims for the United States. She hopes to make it to the 2016 Olympics.

The main reason I was so excited to review “The Stole Dragon of Quanx” is because Becca Mann is so young, yet her age has not stopped her from achieving such great things early on. The fact that this genre is one of my favorites played a role as well, however I found it a great privilege to be considered to write this review. Writing a book at any age is an amazing accomplishment, let alone writing and publishing before you are old enough to vote.

Kale and Sawyer are two of the the main characters in “The Stolen Dragon of Quanx.” As you read, you will follow them as their lives change forever. You will see them develop through ever changing circumstances.

This book is suited for young adults, and in some cases I believe that an experienced reader in lower grade levels would enjoy it as well. The story line is complex, but not so complex that it would be hard to understand for the younger reader. However, as I had just mentioned, it suites young adults, and adults alike.

I loved the fact that the people of Quanx have unique eyes. Their statute in their society rides primarily on their color for example, and I find this very intriguing. The ability to tint the eye color to change your statue is a dangerous, but doable action.

Would you do what it takes to help your people survive? Could you be deceptive to save those you care about?

I could continue with some of the fascinating aspects of this book, but in order not to spoil, I will leave you with my word that if you love a book in this genre, then “The Stolen Dragon of Quanx” is for you. It is full of fantasy, the whimsical, imaginative story lines, with a bit of dystopian flare thrown in.

I promise, you will truly enjoy “The Stolen Dragon of Quanx.”” –Paige Clendenin

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5/5 stars “This book is a great read and a real page turner. It has a surprise at every turn. It is hard not to fall in love with Kale and root for her through the whole book. Just when you think you figured out who the good guys and bad guys are you find another twist. I was certain I knew what would happen with the egg and found I was wrong! Kale gives a great example to girls everywhere of bravery and confidence. The worst part of the book is when it ends and you realize you have to wait for the next one!” –Amy Grogan

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3.5/5 stars “One of the reasons I decided to review this book was how amazed I was by the author, Becca Mann, and how accomplished she is at such a young age. I know writing a book takes amazing strength of will, discipline and prodigious creativity, and I am often in awe of people who manage to do it. Can you imagine having all that at the age of seventeen, while traveling the world and competing with the United States’ national swim team? I am utterely impressed! (I absolutely wish, from the bottom of my heart, that this young writer has the time to do other things, like eat ice cream at the mall, gossip about her favorite tv show – or book, or comic novel, or band, or insert interest here – with her friends, have lighthearted entertainment time with her family. Or else, just be a teen and make mistakes and learn from them. I think it’s very sad when young people think they have to have it all figured out. But carrying too much responsability at a young age is a topic for another post)
And the book, as I hoped, is good! I wouldn’t go as far as some people did, and give it 5 stars. It’s a solid 3.5 stars for me, which I think is great for a debut author. Especially since I think this series has a lot of room to grow, and I fully expect the next books to improve on at least some of the things I hesitated about.
Well, let’s start from the beggining. If I were to put The Stolen Dragon of Quanx in a shelf in my library, it would be in the Middle Grade shelf – even though the main characters ages range from 12 (Vulia, the youngest) to about 17 (Brandon, the oldest). The actual main characters are 15 and 16 (Kale and Sawyer, respectively), and the book’s third party perspective follows them as their lives change forever. Why Middle Grade, and not Young adult? Are the characters not teenagers? Yes, they are. Doesn’t the plot go beyond the boundaries of the character’s own personal lives? Yes, it does. Isn’t the book long enough? Yes, it is (it’s 397 pages long, as a matter of fact). So why?
The reason I believe this book is suited for a younger audience is the fact that there are many holes in the world and character building and in the characters’ arcs and points of view that only Middle Grade children wouldn’t be put off by. Need an exemple? I’ll give you some that were really disrupting to me.
First is the training camp. Even though I loved the description of the camp and I thought the concept of the Jeykeh (the secret keeper) was wonderful, it didn’t seem plausible to me that all the opposing tribes would train their armies next to each other, or even allow for their child-wariors to congregate. Can you insgine a country sharing a military base with their enemy? It is a naive notion, although it serves the purpose of the story. In fact, many aspects of the story seem to sacrifice cohesion in order to serve a purpose in the plot. The idea behind having unique eyes, for exemple, is very intesting. But the way it’s handled is also a little green, where sometimes the color of your eyes plays a major role, and other times simply shading one’s eyes is enough to hide their identity.
Likewise, the characters are often inconsistent. There are little things – like changing their minds for no special reason in the span of some paragraphs (climbing the wall is hard! Oh, wait, it’s not so hard, it’s actually refreshing) – and big things – like some of Kale’s and especially Sawyer’s decisions. Miss Mann even addresses some of these situations, making the characters point out the hole in their behaviour or in other people’s behaviour. But then most of the time she gives no reasonable arguments for it, like simply addressing it would suffice. As a result, none of the characters were completely believable to me. For exemple, most of the young people were very secure of their actions all of the time. They spend most of the book trapped, away from their families, holding secrets that could save their world, yet they don’t wish to share them with an adult even for a minute. They simply decide what they have to do and do it – no matter how important and life threatening – without hesitation!
This is probably the most important reason this book’s review isn’t simple. I am an adult, and at the same time that I see all that, I also understand that a Middle Grade reader would find all those things exciting and plausible. Why not? They want to believe that they would be that brave and decisive if they were in the same situation. And I think that’s absolutely fine!
This book is what I would consider a High Fantasy novel, and Miss Mann does a good job of building a world that is both unique and comprehensible. It should be right up my alley! But the fact that this is a book that was so obviously suited for a certain age made it hard for me to enjoy it as much as I would have liked to. For exemple: even though most of the style of writing has a certain formal, slightly medieval, tone – as you would expect in fantasy writing where swords and bows are the main fighting tools – the author also uses expressions like “guesstimating”.
I think that for those same reasons, the pace felt very slow to me. I frequently stopped reading the story and started doing something else because I had a hard time believing what was happening. But things do happen, and the story is actually pretty action filled. Again, someone younger might really enjoy it. Things also felt over explained at times (which can make them more confusing, if that makes any sense).
But, some things I really enjoyed were all the twists in the end (some I guessed, some I had no idea) and all the hints of adventures and misteries to be unfolded in the future (like the story behind Kale’s sward, Paka’s backstory, and the reason behind how the peasant’s Crowned Prince came to be).
In summation, this story is creative and fun, but more suited to a younger audience. It has a lot of potencial, and I think the next books will be very interesting.
My rating: 3.5/5
Would I read it again? No
Will I read the next ones in the trilogy? Maybe…

Do I recommend it? Yes, but specifically to a Middle Grade, or “tween” audience interested in High Fantasy.” –Raquel V

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5/5 stars “This is a page turner that I definitely recommend! This book is written where you end every chapter wishing you didn’t switch topics in the next but are immediately pulled into the next situation. Unsuspecting teens are thrown together and cajoled into going on a mission to save their world from war. They must steal a dragon egg from a tribe of powerful dragons. It’s not that simple though, woven into the plot creatively are ties to the magical world of dragons, one of the teens in the unsuspecting group is murdering off it’s members, strange alliances are made, intricate battles are fought, identities are hidden, and secrets disclosed and kept. Interestingly, everyone is defined by the color of their eyes and this just adds another element of surprise as you read this amazing fun and exciting book. The book features both strong female and male characters. There are tribes of humans and tribes of dragons. Each has it’s own characteristics (as well as insults). By the end, the characters had grown so much I wasn’t sure who I liked the most. The characters learn as they go along about being unsuspectingly trusting and the ramifications of not making a well thought out decision. They acknowledge their faults but not necessarily with change occurring. It is so clever! I wish the next one was available.” –Shannon Hackett

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5/5 stars “Captivating story.  I couldn’t put it down!  I got drawn into Quanx from the moment I opened the book.” -Asta Ramoskaite

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“Wow, I’m impressed (and awed) at how much Becca has accomplished so young! Congrats and best of luck with the book!” –Nicholas C. Rossi

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5/5 stars “Becca’s book is a fantastic journey of Air, Fire Water, and Earth all represented by brave young adults with a mission. A wonderful first novel by a very accomplished young lady.” –Tina Levasseur

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