There Will Be Dragons

There Will Be Dragons is the opening novel set on a near-utopian future Earth that suddenly and violently has the basic needs of humanity thrust back upon it. All of mankind effectively live a life of leisure, with poverty, hunger, and almost all crime mere myths of the past due to the abundance of materials that can be replicated, the ability of any person to teleport anywhere whenever they wish, and nanites able to heal people in an instant or even change them into whatever form they so please. However, the lack of any sort of pressure on humanity has led to a stagnation in innovation and a collapse in population numbers as people simply don’t want the burden of raising children. To solve this, half of the last vestige of government—the Council—decide that drastic and draconian changes must be enforced upon the population in order to save the species, and the ensuing civil war between the Council cuts off access to power for effectively the entire world’s populations. Nanites made everything, and without power, the nanites no longer function, throwing the world into chaos.

So that’s the premise, and it’s a doozy. There are several key aspects about this universe that Ringo has crafted that enable a truly awesome story to be crafted. Firstly, there is no global industry of any kind and the only people who have any idea about cultivation, manufacturing, or any of the jobs that provide 99% of the things required for humans to survive are historical reenactors, ranging from medieval farming enthusiasts to roman history buffs who spend their days living the life of a legionnaire just because it’s something fun to do. The vast majority of humanity have zero applicable skills. Even the doctors relied entirely on nanites, and even then, the term ‘doctor’ applies more to their ability to help people sculpt their bodies into anything from dragons to unicorns. This book truly brings home the old adage that civilised society only lasts for as long as the lights are on. As soon as things start to collapse, we are treated to a sleugh of all the worst aspects of humanity, and I mean the very worst. One thing that I have to say about this book is the incredibly commendable job it does at portraying the struggles of rape survivors. It tackles a subject which is often completely overlooked or ignored by similar such novels due to how uneasy it can make readers feel, but here Ringo not only addresses it but has clearly put significant time and effort into researching the harrowing effects that rape can have and the best ways that people have developed to overcome them. It’s a powerful message, and I genuinely learnt a lot.

So for the story itself. This book is, at its core, about how to rebuild a society, with the narrative populated by some wonderful characters. This isn’t just a group of survivors banding together to fight off mobs of immoral wretches who have turned to banditry and murder when their paradise collapsed. We get to watch a society develop from the ground up, with the reasons for and implications of each major decision hashed out before our very eyes. I am a huge nerd when it comes to history, and not just all the flashy battles. I personally love all the minutia that go into how a civilisation developed the way it did and how different peoples dealt with different challenges. That is what this book is at its core, and the fact that the characters within are also very well written is just a nice big dollop of icing on the cake. Of course, with it being a Ringo novel, we also get the same level of detail in the establishment of the new military that our nascent society must fashion in order to keep the monsters from the gates, and of course I lapped that up as well. One of the most interesting and novel plot points is that the omniscient and absolutely neutral super-computer that keeps the world’s natural processes in check also prevents explosions and the build-up of extreme pressures from occurring anywhere on the surface of the planet. The result of this is that there can be no firearm, no internal combustion engines, and effectively no mass industrialisation. This is a genius idea that, if I’m being honest, definitely needed to be explained in more detail earlier in the story. It’s kind of essential to the whole premiss of the book but wasn’t actually explained in any detail until over halfway through. Regardless, this one rule enforces some amazing constraints for the burgeoning societies that allow for some awesome historical mash-ups in entirely lore-friendly manners.

Start to finish, the level of detail within the book is balanced perfectly with the rate of pacing. At no time was I ever bored. I was always left wanting to know a little bit more about each new feature that was developing, and by the time it got explained I was already eager for the next titbit that was being shown to me. All in all, this book was a joy to listen to. Did it match the utterly amazing hights that some of Ringo’s other novels have risen to in my humble opinion? In short, no, but the man has written two of my all-time favourite series so is a victim of his own success on that front. However, There Will Be Dragons still more than earnt its place as a brilliant novel with a huge amount of potential, which to me tends to be the default for the high calibre of Ringo’s writing.

As for narration, I don’t think that I’ve come across any of Tim Fannon’s work before, but the man was able to hit a wide range of not just human voices but also the plethora of creatures that humanity had turned itself into. It was a solid performance worthy of the high quality of the prose.

Personal Score: 4.5 stars

Professional Score: 4.5 stars

Like the way I write a review? Then you might like the way I write a novel. Link to Book 1 in the Blood and Balance series below, or for more info on my book series click HERE.

Buy 'The Sage's Lot (Blood and Balance, Book 1)' here!