#Review: Dragons Will Fall by Susan Scott - 3 Wine Glasses

Title: Dragons Will Fall
Series: Kingdom Come #1
Author: Susan Scott
Format: ebook, 265 pages
Published: September 14th 2015 by Zannadu, LLC
Links: Goodreads | Amazon | B&N
Reviewer: Linda
Source: Author
Rating: 3 out of 5 Wine Glasses

From Award of Excellence finalist and Angie Award winner, Susannah Scott, comes a new, ancient world series full of exiled magicians, imperiled dragon-shifters, and steamy romance.

An outcast magician with lousy control...

Kas is a half-light with the “gift” of invisibility and healing, but her sometimes deadly magic makes her distrusted by her own people. In an effort to prove her worth and save her people from execution, she infiltrates an enemy castle on a spy mission, but is kidnapped by a powerful intruder. When her only friend is taken hostage as well, Kas has no choice but to embrace her volatile magic and turn to her captor for help.

A dragon-shifter king with an island in revolt...

Cullen is the most powerful dragon of his generation, but strength and cunning won’t stop the mysterious scourge killing his kinsmen. After he steals Kas away to heal them, he’s incensed to find her magic is uncontrollable. Despite her unpredictable powers and non-existent fighting skills, he soon becomes convinced she holds the key to saving the dying dragon race. He’s willing to do anything to gain her cooperation. Even if it means breaking all taboos and seducing the crafty little magician.

With a kingdom of enemies after them both, Kas and Cullen must learn to trust each other before their kingdoms are rendered extinct.

Linda's Thoughts:
Her people, the Half-Lights, were the by-blows of the full-blood Magicians and humans. As such, they were outcasts from both kingdoms. Their magic was too unpredictable for the magicians, and too magic - period - for the humans.

DRAGONS WILL FALL, BOOK 1 by Susan Scott heralds the first book in Susan's new Kingdom Come series. If you follow my reviews, you know that I love tales featuring dragons and that I have thoroughly enjoyed this author's Las Vegas Dragons series. Therefore, it was a given that this fresh series was an automatic must-read for me. DRAGONS WILL FALL was the story of Dragon-Shifter King Cullen and Half-Light Kas.

Cullen's dragons are dying. He has not found anything that could save them and is desperate to find a cure. He pleaded with the Magicians to help and they instructed him to find a certain Half-Light who is gifted in healing. Cullen finds an invisible Half-Light in the castle of Humans and demands her help in locating the Half-Light he seeks. What he doesn't know is that she is the one he seeks.

Unfortunately, I struggled through the first half of this book. If this book had been written by a new author to me, it probably would have ended up in my DNF pile. But, because I have loved Susan's other series, I persevered. I'm glad that I did as the second half of the book evolved into a captivating read with some neat characters, intrigue, romance, and battles. It has also now incited my interest in reading the next two books in this series.

I'm happy to report that I got to where I liked the hero and heroine, Cullen and Kas. I enjoyed seeing them learn to trust and to grow as individuals and as a couple. But, for some reason, I just couldn't connect with them at first. I also started having strong feelings for some of the supporting characters about the same time in the story as I connected with Cullen and Kas. I do not know why it took me so long.

In the story, the kingdoms of Humans, Magicians and Dragons do not get along and perhaps the author wrote those sections too well for me as there seemed to be valid reasons to dislike each of the realms and their inhabitants. The Half-Lights were kingdom-less, but even they were afflicted with in-fighting. The second half of the book was more focused on just one kingdom - the Dragons' kingdom - and individual characters there started standing out and not being as despicable as they were at first. I have read some other reviews and I am most definitely in the minority. So... please take my opinion for what it's worth. I normally love romantic fantasies and dragons ordinarily float my boat, but perhaps I was just not in the mood and didn't realize that I wasn't.

Following please find a few of my favorite quotes:

"What has you roaring like a bull with his prick hung in a fence?"
---

Beauty and power was commonplace to the dragons as mud and manure to a stable boy.
---

"You can't purchase me with a bunch of stones."
"I wouldn't dream of purchasing you." Cullen laughed low in his chest and smiled, this time showing even white teeth. "You're too much trouble. I thought I'd just steal you for a bit."
---

The dragon marking rested, his fangs concealed and his eyes shut.
"Your dragon is pleased," she said.
"Indeed, he is."

There were some upsetting betrayals and losses over the course of this story. Thankfully, the epilogue was both a happy ending and an intriguing preview of the next book, which will be Hank and Muriel's story. Felix and Lettie's story will be out in CY2016. Hank, Muriel, and Felix are three supporting characters that I grew attached to in this book, so I can't wait to read their stories.

DRAGONS WILL FALL, BOOK 1 shows a lot of promise and has some really cool characters. I'm definitely thinking Susan's Kingdom Come series will get stronger and I'm looking forward to seeing that happen. I'm ready for Book 2!


Series Information Kingdom Come: 
Book 1: Dragons Will Fall, (Kas and Cullen) September 2015
Book 2: Waters Will Rage, (Muriel and Hank), early 2016
Book 3: Kingdom Come, (Felix and Lettie), late 2016