Project Lore

Night of the Dragon was released days after Wrath of the Lich King, which is likely the main reason the book is overlooked.  I mean come on, we were too busy leveling to bother reading about the plights of Grim Batol and those who went to investigate.  Hitting level 80 is far more important than whatever may be going on in that mountain.  AMIRITE?  This is true, I was busy leveling to 80, but I have sleeping issues on a regular basis.  My roving mind forces me to read or play DS until the day's events have been replaced by my own imagination or digital stimuli.  Then I can lay my head down to join Ysera.  If it wasn't for the fact that I was so far behind on my extended universe literature, I would have read Richard Knaak's latest novel upon release.

The sequel to Day of the Dragon - a book I enjoyed - steps from the beaten path by removing Orcs from the main story.  In fact, the entirety of the Horde is neglected in the main story, save a single Blood Elf of the Windrunner line.  To me this may act as a big turn-off to the Horde base, but the novels would start losing originality if each one tried to encompass plights from both sides of the mortal lines.  Of course, you could say the opposite, some Horde players may enjoy reading from the "other side" since they never see that in the digital world, but I digress.

The latest novel focuses on the mysterious energies surrounding Grim Batol, energies that beckon the attention of many.  Our first lead draenei is introduced, the sexualized Iridi, who possess a powerful staff given to her by the naaru.  Knaak reintroduces a handful of his pet characters - characters which some Warcraft players despise - during the investigation to Grim Batol, including Vereesa, her mate Rhonin and his good buddy Krasus.  It's a bit annoying that Knaak constantly falls back to these characters, but in Night of the Dragon, only Krasus is presented as a main character.

Spoiler Alert:  Unlike my previous discussions on the novels, I am going to actually lay out some harsh spoilers. You have been warned!

The book starts off with Knaak using his favorite word, leviathan, twice.  With more than five dragons in the novel, you better believe that he drops his most used descriptor dozens of times.  His lack of sentence differentiation should not be the defining feature of this discussion though.  Especially since there are other points of contention to whine about.  There is very little value in reading the novel in my opinion.  Sure, we are introduced to a couple of new antagonists, but they are seemingly dispatched of quickly.  Most of these deaths can be attributed to Krasus and the handful of crazy powers he obtains during his struggles against Sintharia.  Powers of such convenience that one may think the book was written with Yu-Gi-Oh in mind.  Seriously, those people pull the one card that can save them 100% of the time.  What are they, Death Knights?

If it wasn't for Iridi, Kalecgos' growth, the return of Rom and his dwarven band's side story then I may label this book as a mediocre title on the level of Beyond the Dark Portal.  The longest Warcraft-branded novel to date did very little to compel me to read further.  Even the twist at the end was a giant yawn.  You mean Deathwing the Destroyer didn't die and was using Sinestra as another one of his pawns?  Shocking!  Actually the most shocking, and perhaps the most interesting part of the novel, was the discovery that raptors are semi-sentient beings with goals, morals and aspirations.  The destruction of the lead raptor hit me almost as hard as the lose of Rom.  And for the love of god, can the Demon Soul finally be gone?  Just let it go already.  Make up some other new, incredibly powerful artifact.  If a fragment appears in a future novel, I swear I'll explode.

Spoilers done.

Getting through Night of the Dragon was a bit of a chore.  Thankfully, I earned my 50 cents and can put it behind me now.  I seriously hope that his next novel is entirely about gnomes and troggs.  Let's test Knaak's vocabulary for those with incredibly small statures.  Sure, his story was fine, but the lack of solid lore or backstory has left me wanting; wanting Christie Golden's upcoming novel, Arthas: Rise of the Lich King, even more.  I am sure many more people will be reading Arthas than any previous to it.  How could you not be intrigued?  It deals directly with the current antagonist in World of Warcraft!  I just hope that I haven't pumped myself up for it so much that the first hardcover Warcraft novel can't live up to the hype.  Or that it flat out sucks, like The Matrix's sequels.  But that is what we get for a sequel to lifted work.