Silent No More

First off, I want to thank the author for writing this book. Seriously. Thank you. 

Miss Percy checks so many boxes – witty writing? Check. Unique protagonist? Check. Dragons? Check. Check, check, and down the list it goes. Olson has created a charming, delightful, hilarious story that is sure to please even the grumpiest of misers. All you lovers of grimdark? Come out of the shadows and be enchanted. Please, do yourselves a favor and give this one a shot. 

Miss Percy is a spinster, stuck in her sister’s home caring for her sister’s children and generally leading a boring life. She has the soul of a caretaker – that person who always volunteers for the hardest, thankless jobs, and who doesn’t complain, and who forgets themselves and loses their identity as a person who is also worthy of love and care. She resonated with me in ways that made me both uncomfortable and happy – I saw myself in her. 

Miss Percy’s life is thrown upside down when she is left a small inheritance by a great uncle, and what do you know, a dragon egg hatches. This throws her into a series of events that will leave the reader laughing, possibly crying, and falling in love with Fitz the dragon, Miss Percy, Mr. Wiggan the vicar, and Mrs. Babbinton the housekeeper. Even the children, Matthew and Nettie, will leave you wanting to pat their heads and give them cake. 

I won’t spoil the details for you, but I will say this. I was hard pressed to find any flaws in this book. I’m not being dramatic. I literally loved every single thing about it. Not only was it brimming with hilarious, clever writing, but it also tackled some heavy themes in the midst of all the cacophony. 

At her heart, Miss Percy is smart, funny, sweet, and adventurous. But life hasn’t turned out the way she had hoped. So for many, many years she lost herself. She found her identity in what she could do for other people. How she could serve them, make their lives easier. She didn’t stand up for herself against her sister’s manipulation and abuse. But then all that changes when a dragon hatches from an egg. The catalyst, for her, was finding her worth in something other than what she could do for someone else. And in meeting people who saw her, listened to her, and treated her as having worth outside of what she could give them. 

You can practically hear the author ask the question – reader, what will be the catalyst for you? I picked this book up at a time in my life where I needed, desperately, to hear this message. For a few days, I could set aside the burdens I carried and dive into a world that made me laugh, and wish that people like Mr. Wiggan and Mrs. Babbinton actually existed. But it also made me ponder the direction my life is headed, not in a way that thumps me on top of the head, but in a gentle, kind way. Like a friend taking my hand and pulling me along, slowly, to a new path I’d never walked before. 

So, while this book is full of charm, fun, and kind, sweet vicars and lots of cheese and cake, it also challenges the reader to look at their own life, and dare to believe that they can take a different way, choose a different path, and embrace their identity apart from other people’s expectations. 

This is definitely one of my favorite books. I’m gobsmacked that a story like this isn’t being read everywhere, in multiple languages, with thousands of reviews. I hope that is where it is headed, though. I am hard-pressed to find any flaws in it, and give it a hearty 5/5 stars. Go read it. Now.