The Dragonet Prophecy is Book 1 of the popular middle grades series Wings of Fire. I read it not because I have any interest in dragon fantasy, but because I wanted to look at top books for that age level.

In the early chapters of the book, I thought the storyline was way too cutesy for me. Dragonets are dragon children. The prophecy is about five dragonets who are destined to end a long-fought war. The presumed dragonets of destiny were stolen from their families when still in their eggs, and are being kept and trained in a cave under the mountain.

The dragonets are tutored in the history and traditions of the dragons, and also in dragon warfare. Most are reluctant about their role. They would much rather be out in the real world. They engineer an escape, which results in their capture by the evil dragon queen, Scarlet, who holds daily gladiator tournaments among her many captives.

The story gets interesting for me when the main character, a dragonet named Clay, tries to get himself out of the terrible situations he’s forced to deal with by not fighting, or at least defending himself and his friends without killing his opponents. I’m concerned about the abundance of violence in this book, but having the readers be privy to Clay’s inner struggles about causing pain to another dragon redeems the book for me. Kids are exposed to all kinds of violence in videogames, but do any games explore other avenues of conflict resolution besides killing your enemy?

I can see how this story could capture the imagination of a middle grader, and despite my original misgivings, I recommend The Dragonet Prophecy.