This is the sixth book in the Temeraire series! You can read about the earlier installments here for the first, second, third, fourth, and fifth! This book takes us again away from England and to Australia where Laurence is sent essentially as punishment.
After fighting off Napoleon in England, Laurence and Temeraire are sent to Australia with three dragon eggs. They are charged with bringing up some dragons there to start a group, but it’s really a punishment as mostly convicts are sent to work in Australia. Iskerika and Granby end up coming with them, as Iskerika is determined to get an egg from Temeraire (he doesn’t seem pleased about this). Thrankey comes as well, to explore that part of the world supposedly. Once there, there is instantly a revolt against the leadership in Australia. Laurence is hoping to get a pardon out of this so he wants nothing to do with it. Pretty shortly after they land though, the horrible captain Rankin who practically killed his dragon in the first book shows up for one of the eggs. It’s the offspring of some of the feral dragons in the previous few books, and once he pops out Ceasar ignores Temeraire’s warnings about Rankin and takes to him. The three dragons then are tasked with exploring the interior of Australia, they find a really nice valley that Laurence considers staying in more permanently, and then one of the two remaining eggs is stolen!
They take off after the thieves, but it is slow going. Iskerika has to head back to Sydney to update them on the journey, and to let the ship that’s supposed to take Granby home to not leave yet. Temeraire gets caught in a firestorm and has to spend a lot of time recovering. There are also mysterious bunyips that pick off the men from underground tunnels and almost catch Temeraire in quicksand. While they’re looking though, the third egg hatches. It’s a very small egg and they did not have much hope for it, and when the dragon pops out it looks even weirder and cannot fly. There is an argument over whether to dispose of it as a mercy killing, but Demane (one of the boys from Africa) ends up taking the dragon. He has to hunt for it, but eventually the dragon (named Kulingile) fills out his air sacs and starts practically floating away. The dragon surgeon with them says that means he’ll be able to fly, and in fact this air sacs are so big he’ll likely be a heavy-weight dragon! This causes arguments as the people that wanted Kulingile to die earlier now don’t think that Demane should have control of him.
Eventually they catch up and find that the stolen egg has hatched to the Australian natives, who are very kind to the visitors and have been doing trade with the Chinese for a while. It is revealed that they have sea serpents carry packages between them and have been evading regulation that way. Tharkey has secretly been here to investigate smuggling, so he is pleased with the information. Meanwhile though, the British realize that the port is here and try to attack it, upsetting Temeraire. The natives call upon the sea serpents and it quickly turns into a rescue mission to save the hapless sailors. The book ends with them heading back to Sydney, Granby and Iskerika leaving to return to England and Tharkey going back to India to pass on his information, and Laurence telling Temeraire he would like to return to the valley and set up their life there. He’s had enough of fighting for governments.
Not going to lie, the book is a bit of a slog. A lot of the first half has to do with the Australian politics and who is rebelling against who and I simply don’t care to pay attention to that. It only gets interesting once the egg is stolen, and even after that it is a lot of running around chasing their mysterious thieves. It just reminds me that the best books of this series are the two that take place in England as those feel much more grounded and less like we have to be explained absolutely everything going on. Rankin’s addition does help with this a little as we already are familiar with him, but he’s so horrible it’s more of a love-to-hate situation. I did enjoy meeting the new dragons hatching though!
Kulingile is a really interesting character. I was hoping it would go in a slightly different direction from how the book went, allowing him to live while he couldn’t contribute in the usual way of dragons was super anti-capitalist and imperialist. Temeraire even supposes he could be an artist or a poet at one point. (He doesn’t take to it haha.) But then having the twist of Kulingile actually being able to grow into a very conventionally useful dragon kind of killed it. It took a cool disability narrative and made it “inspirational” or whatever. I can’t help but feel a little disappointed, even if I am still interested in how his story will go.
The series has also gotten progressively nicer to native characters as the series goes. It parallels Laurence’s thoughts on the matter, as in this book he repeatedly stands up for the native Australians when British officials dehumanize them. Having said that, we don’t spend a ton of time getting to know them so it does not feel like rah rah representation, more doing the bare minimum. But you really never know with books set in the Napoleonic Wars so it is nice to see.
I am so close to the end of this series, I will definitely
keep going with it! If nothing else I love the dragons and the increased
thought process from Temeraire. He somehow manages to be very child-like and
endearing while coming up with complex thought processes about duty and loyalty
and questioning authority. A really loveable character, I hope I can enjoy his
voice up until the end!
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