3 out of 4 stars
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The Lone Dragon Knight is a fantasy novel by D.C. Clemens. If features Mercer, a young man who has lost his memory due to a traumatic event in the past. All he knows is that he has been sold to a Garf, a powerful criminal, and was forced to fight other men and beasts in the arena.
The kidnappers corrupted him with a powerful curse. The corruption was embedded in his arm and was slowly spreading. Many other young people who were corrupted lived very short lives as they were slowly going crazy, but, for some reason, Mercer was able to keep the corruption at bay and be lucid at all times.
After several years of doing the owner’s bidding, he managed to escape. Of course, Garf wouldn’t let such a prized possession go free, so he sent others to capture him. But Mercer evaded them and fled from the area. He soon found himself in an underground ruined city within the mountains, where he discovered a very special, ancient sword holding a dragon’s spirit within. With Aranath at his side, Mercer decided to find those who captured and corrupted him and set out to learn about his real past.
The story was fast-paced and there was always something going on. The book was far from boring. Throughout his journey, Mercer met some strange people, including a vampire called Clarissa who would accompany him for the rest of the trip. Mercer managed to forge some powerful alliances along the way, and his quick wit and knowledge of fighting saved his skin more than once.
Mercer also had a trait that slightly bothered me throughout the entire novel. He was just a young boy, less than 20 years old (more like 17-18 if I understood correctly), but he was wise well beyond his years. The way he talked and the things he inferred from his speech were that of an adult many years older than he was. I was hoping the author would solve this discrepancy by gradually giving us insights about his past, but that was not to happen. You’ll need to read the second book to find anything about Mercer’s past or what made him who he is.
That lack of closure was one of my biggest pet peeves in the book, along with the many grammatical errors. The author has problems with identifying object pronouns, which are those that something is being done to them, for them, or with them. For example, he writes “you promise to leave Trevon and I alone” when the proper form would be “Trevor and me.” Or “giving Clarissa and I” instead of “giving Clarissa and me,” and “He then taught Vey and I the spell” instead of “He then taught Vey and me the spell.” He also wrote “lied deeper” instead of “lay deeper,” and “Unware” instead of “Unaware.” Some of these issues could have been fixed by running the pages through a proofreader (or even pasting the text in Microsoft Word, which would have immediately highlighted such inconsistencies).
The Lone Dragon Knight was an interesting read, but I have to give it 3 out of 4 stars. I love books featuring dragons, but the only dragon in this book was hiding inside a sword. Also, Mercer’s past was left unresolved and I’m still finding issues with Mercer's adult qualities which you don’t usually find in a teenage boy. Teenagers just don’t speak and act like he did. And finally, the grammatical and spelling errors were too many to ignore. I can recommend it to fantasy book lovers who enjoy adventure, and worlds full of magic spells and otherworldly creatures, such as vampires and trolls (and hopefully actual dragons in the next book).
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The Lone Dragon Knight
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