Book review: The Saint of Dragons by Jason Hightman

This was a thrift store purchase from Savers. I picked it up because the premise sounded really interesting. Amazon/back of the book summary:

The ancient dragons -- of the time of the legendary Saint George and earlier -- have never disappeared entirely. Instead, they've moved undercover -- and into human society. Now one lonely schoolboy is about to learn where the dragons have gone ...

Educated at boarding schools, Simon St. George has never met his parents. When a ragged-looking man shows up claiming to be his father, Simon is skeptical, and when the man kidnaps him, he's indignant to say the least.

Then the man claims to be a descendant of England's Saint George and a career dragon fighter. Why should Simon believe any of this nonsense? But what if the man is telling the truth? What if the dragons know he's out there?

Rich with the dragon lore of legend, the saint of dragons continues and enlarges on the tale of the centuries-old conflict between dragons and humans that rages even today.

Neat, right? You know I love me some Chosen One/mythological creatures are still around stories. A lot of the elements from this book are very familiar: parentless boy at boarding school, picked on by classmates, dreams of something larger, learns of his fantastical lineage/destiny, etc. Overall I thought this book was good, if a bit done, but the writing was off somehow. Things went by too fast, and very little was fleshed out or explained in a satisfactory way. I was unsurprised when I read the author's note in the back, where he said he went to film school and wrote a screenplay about this book. It definitely reads like a movie, where we go from scene to scene and it's all very visually minded, but it lacks that true novel feel. We don't feel truly settled in the book or story; we're kind of just watching it whizz by.

Hightman definitely places plot and thrills over characterization; the characters feel like movie tropes in the way they interact with each other, and it doesn't feel real. I think Simon is the most fleshed-out character, but that's because we're seeing the book through his eyes. He makes a lot of stupid choices in the book that are incredibly annoying to read. Why don't characters in fantasy books read other fantasy books? I have to include this quote from one of the Amazon reviewers about this book because it's perfect: 

The plot reads like a series of short adventures and nothing seems very hard (including escaping from somewhere no one has ever escaped from). Like Rowling's books, there are plenty of inconsistencies with details only making sense for a specific scene and then being thrown out the window.  ~Joshua Koppel

There are a lot of cool inventions and world-building (as it were) things that we don't get explanations for. There are runes on the special dragon-fighting armor that enable the wearer to fly when touched! But how? What language are the runes in? How is the armor made? Most of the cool stuff is handwaved away with "a magician made it". There's also a prophecy that falls flat. Personally there are too many things jam-packed into this book.

The title is misleading and makes it sound like the St. Georges are the patron saints of dragons, rather than their sworn enemies. There's also a plot [SPOILERS] where dragons assimilated into human society by posing as them and are in charge of every political party in power/crime syndicate/big evil business/etc., which is way too close to the antisemitic lizards in charge of everything conspiracy (google it). I don't think this is what the author had in mind, as many people don't know the lizards conspiracy is about Jewish people, but still. The dragons were stereotypes of the countries they were from, especially the Chinese Black Dragon. I thought it was super weird that the black dragon was the only nice dragon, but the magic that emanated off of him was still dark magic that did bad things like make acid rain and conjoin people who walked next to each other on the street???? idk. I think dragons are cool and I wish more of them had been good. [END SPOILERS]

Anyway, this was entertaining enough and was a pleasant enough way to pass the time. Kids won't have the same complaints I do about the writing and pacing; in fact, it might be a good book to hand a kid who prefers movies to books. You could definitely do worse than this book, but if the things I mentioned drive you nuts, I wouldn't recommend it. If I come across the sequel, I'll read it.

trigger warnings I'd apply to this book: blood, gore, animal (ish) death, human death, magical violence, violence, fire

Score: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Read in: early December
From: thrift store
Format: paperback
Status: giving away 

App game review: Matchington Mansion

her face looks way better nowadays. I guess she got work done?

Matchington Mansion, aka the reason I've read almost nothing the last few months, is a typical match 3+ game with fireworks and other power-ups. The difference is, instead of just playing the games to move up the levels, each completed game gains you a star, which you can use to acquire things for your mansion and complete activities. You also gain coins, which you can use to remodel your house and buy things in the regular way. The cost of the items varies. For some reason, it only costs 30 gold coins to buy a runner for the huge double stairway, the same as a houseplant, but it costs 150 coins to buy a reproduction of a van Gogh or Mona Lisa. The prices seem chosen at random.

The matching part of the game is pretty straightforward and similar to other matching games (e.g. Sugar Smash rather than Bejeweled). However, when 1-direction fireworks are hit by other firework blasts, they explode in that 1 direction, even if that's the same direction of the first blast, rendering the firework useless. In other games, 1-direction fireworks/rockets erupt in the opposite direction when hit by a blast (i.e. left/right --> up & down and vice versa). In other games, you can choose the direction by swapping it with the shape above (vertical) or beside it (horizontal). It is nice that you can make a firework blast vertically one level down/up/right/left when needed, but it should go off in the opposite direction of the other firework's blast. One thing I do really like is that firework blasts don't affect rainbow balls, the way they do in other matching games. I've lost too many rainbow balls prematurely because they took a firework going off near them as an invitation to select a random shape near them and whisk all of those away, instead of waiting to be used by me. If I have two rainbow balls in columns next to each other but several shapes above/below each other, I can use a firework to put them next to each other. It's very handy.

Another thing I would change is that when you lose, you don't get a "hail Mary" option to set off all your fireworks and rainbow balls to see if that will help collect the shapes and things you're still missing. I've only seen Sugar Smash do this, but still. I do like that they set off the fireworks at the end AND let you tap to skip that! I've probably lost days to watching the celebratory end fireworks points grab after winning games. There are too many taps in the rest of the game, though.

The game shockingly has no ads, but there are obvious cash grabs going on constantly. There's always a "sale" going on for coins, power-ups, etc. to buy for real. I would rather eat my own hair than spend real American human dollars on fake gold coins for a video game. It costs FIVE HUNDRED (500) coins to buy five more turns when you lose a game, which is just Trumpian levels of shameless robbery. In a different game, it costs 70 coins to win five more turns. Ridiculous. It costs 400 coins to fill up your lives when you've run out (it should take 100, max) and each life takes 15 minutes to regenerate, which is just way too freaking long. Lives should regenerate in 10 minutes, maximum. The only way to gain coins on purpose (other than winning or being awarded) is to buy them with actual human money. They should give us the option to watch ads in exchange for a coin or life, the way all other mobile games do. We should also be able to watch an ad for more turns when we lose a game all the time and not just sometimes randomly when you have unlimited lives and don't really need that option anyway. You can watch an ad to get a free booster or life before you actually start the game, but only sometimes. I will say that the ads are much shorter than the ones I've had to suffer through in other games.

You are encouraged to join a team of other players; I joined one called The Librarians. Every so often a team challenge comes along, which our team never wins, but the best thing about teams is that you can request lives from your team members!!! You give a life to a team member by tapping a 'give' button on their request, and you get a coin in return. They do the same thing for you. You can get up to five lives from your team members, unless you already have your lives full. Even if enough time has gone by since you made your lives request that your lives are full, the lives given to you by your teammates will still be there waiting for you; they don't expire. That is the best part of this game, imo.

The game is replete with challenges, each one coming on the heels of the other, so you're constantly racing remote control cars/in a pillow fight/gathering food for a food truck or juice stand, etc. I don't mind the extra opportunities to gain coins and power-ups, but these challenges should be decor-based. It makes more sense for me to join a challenge that has something to do with interior decor, given the theme of this game. I'd love the opportunity to win more furniture and decor pieces, candles, etc. It would make more sense if I was helping a local furnishings shop decorate for the holidays, or helping a neighbor remodel. If I wanted to gather food items, I'd download a cooking/restaurant game. The neighborhood children are the ones who invite you to the race car/pillow fight challenges, and they are annoying, but the adults who own the food truck and juice stand are beyond the pale. I cannot imagine for a second running one of those food establishments and then relying on other people to give me the ingredients that I need to run my business! I get the money they make by selling their products, but still. My least favorite is a random old-timey adventurer ballooner guy who just lands on my street and demands I set off fireworks so he can have hot air to power his balloon with. The gall! Fix your own problems, jerk! I also hate how when you're doing a challenge, you can't just hit 'replay game' when you lose; you always have to X out from a guilt-tripping box that says "are you SURE you want to quit? You'll lose your X game winning streak!" It's the freaking worst, and it's there even when you haven't collected anything for the challenge or are out of money. Also, the challenges go on for way too long. There's no way two elementary aged children would be allowed to have a remote control car race for a full week straight, nor would they have the patience.

There is a big cast of characters to interact with, chief of which is your "best friend" and interior decorator, Tiffany. She is the stand-in for you since you cannot actually interact with anyone in the game (accepting packages, building things, setting things up, etc.), although everyone acknowledges and addresses you by name. It's weird that she's an interior decorator, ostensibly there to help you decorate your house, yet you are the one who chooses everything. Maybe she narrows down the choices? She lives with you in your mansion, rent-free, and is with you 100% of the time. In everything but name, she is your girlfriend. Think about it: the only bedroom that is furnished is yours. There's a couch in the entryway and in your bedroom, but no sign she sleeps there. Her clothes are in the master room closet alongside yours. At one point she sets up a cute picnic to have with you in the garden.  You commission a bookshelf to be built in the library to house her books! I mean, come on. In contrast to my theory, she constantly flirts with Jack, the carpenter and handyman, which is understandable because he's a total hipster hottie, but he is completely clueless. #acerep  My favorite thing about Jack is that he is literally in love with the mansion. Normal.

The antagonist, or the closest thing to one, is Rex, a sexist Southern casino owner. The former owner of the mansion, Jane, a famous novelist, was his cousin, and he believes the mansion is rightfully his. She bequeathed the mansion to you because you were best friends (another blow to the Tiffany BFF story), and she and Rex were estranged. Rex does some annoying things in the beginning, but we are slowly getting to know him and seeing another side of him. I still want to get a restraining order against him, though. At one point Rex's dog digs up the herb garden, and he didn't apologize or offer to fill it in. I had to (pay to) fill it in myself! Rude-ass bitch (the guy, not the dog).

The other most important characters are Jia, the gardener; Antonio, the mailman; and Ravi, the cook.   Jia is Asian, and a typical Wise Brown Person who spouts aphorisms. She is a neighbor, which suggests she owns a house similar to yours and comes from a similar social standing as Jane, but she always comes over and does your gardening for you (for free? or are the stars payment for her?). It makes no sense. Ravi appears to be South Asian, although he peppers his sentences with Italian phrases and mentions being in Mexico and having an Aztec curse placed on him, so who knows. Having only the POC characters (besides Jack) be in obvious service positions? Racist. We also have a latino dude named Carlos who is a G-rated Latin Lover stereotype who walks around composing love songs with a guitar, and a g*psy stereotype lady who sits in a caravan wagon with a fortune telling ball, wreathed in scarves. Falling back on extremely tired and old stereotypes? Racist. Gustavo the ballooner guy is black, as is Antonio (their Hispanic names suggest they are Afrolatinos), and the latina museum archaeologist lady and little black scientist girl are cool, but everyone else is white. My least favorite character, besides Rex, is Edna, a neighbor who is the human version of Sadness from Inside Out. She's deeply boring and serves no purpose.

Also racist? The "tea garden" you have the option to decorate and win. It's a very clear Japanese garden situation, and is cultural appropriation. Every so often you get the chance to decorate either your mansion for the holiday or another place during a certain amount of time (usually a few days). The method of decorating is not by gaining stars (although you still get 1 per game) but with gaining and spending light bulbs (amount varies by game). I like that once you've bought something, you can switch it up and change style without paying anything extra, unlike in the regular game. If you finish decorating in time, you get to keep the decorations/place. I've gained a mountain cabin that way, but I've failed to acquire the other places because I kept getting stuck on games and running out of time.

That brings me to my least favorite thing about these games: some of them are almost impossible to win, leaving me stuck playing them for days. This is deeply annoying and keeps me from doing anything at all, since I can't gain stars without winning the game, and I can't buy more lives or power-ups because I don't have enough money to do so, and I can't get money because you have to win games to do so. It's ridiculous. They should make it so that if you lose a game ten times in a row, you should get a free power-up to help you win. I know they do that on purpose so that you'll get frustrated and buy unlimited power-ups/lives or whatever. You'd think that when you finally get through a super-hard game, the next couple games would be easy, but noooooo. It's ridiculous.

The game is decent, when it comes to user experience. There's a bit of a learning curve with everything but the matching itself, and the game acts like you know more than you do sometimes even though you've just started. For instance, whenever the juice stand challenge happens, Tiffany and the owner go through this spiel where she thinks he's his twin brother. I have been playing this game for months and have never encountered this twin. It's weird. There's an address book in the game with all the characters you meet and info you learn about them, which is why I've been able to include  their names in this blog post. IMO, that space would be better served by having a Help menu to explain everything. I didn't realize you could actually visit other real user's houses until a month or two into the game.

The methods of renovating don't make sense to me. We should renovate the inside of the house before working on the outside, but we work on the outside entry first, then on the entryway and parlor, then on the bedroom. The gardens and grounds are 75% completed already, although I've only finished renovating/decorating 6 rooms and 1 bathroom. There are many other rooms to be completed, most of which aren't that important, such as the ballroom, but still. This game had me renovate the library immediately after finishing renovating the bedroom and bathroom, which was great for me, but it doesn't make any logical sense. They had me renovate the dining room before we did the kitchen!!!! They're making me work on the garage!!! Madness. I should be able to choose what room to do next.

I really like decorating the rooms, but I disagree with some of the ways things work in this game. Some activities/items take 2 or more stars to do, regardless of difficulty level, when I think they should take 1 star. You use your coins to buy the furnishings, but I wish there was more variability in the options. You get 3 options for most things, although you can gain more options by visiting other players' houses and seeing what they've done with the place. Whichever of the 3 options you choose, you are locked into a color scheme, as the furniture, walls, and floor/carpet are all supposed to go together. So if I choose a green couch, I have to choose the green walls and carpet, since the other colors will totally clash with the couch. There have been times when I've liked a patterned rug or something, but it didn't go with the current furniture I'd chosen at all because of the color.

I wish they would let you choose the pattern and the color separately, instead of having to choose between the brown plaid, solid blue, and pink Victorian wallpaper. There are WAY too many plaid and checked options, and not enough flooring options. I had to go with tile for my upstairs hallway because all of the other options were hideous. There are plants as well, and there is an overwhelming amount of options for them. I wish I had 12+ options for furniture and decor! I hate everything you can choose for the bedroom, except for 1 cool-looking couch. There are some items that the game doesn't give you options for, which is annoying. I wanted to choose my desk and chair for the library!
You can change whatever options you picked for things, if applicable, but it's annoying that each plant is treated as a separate thing, and when you get a new option you have to tap on all the plants to acknowledge the new option. It's a drag.

Anyway, I do enjoy this game when I am not fruitlessly losing an impossible game calculated to pressure me into spending real human dollars. I love interior design and matching games, and this game lets you live out the dream of inheriting a mansion from your best friend, a famous rich author, and getting to decorate and live in it rent-free with your blond femme girlfriend and your cat and dog. Truly the dream.

EDIT: I have finally been allowed to start redoing the second bedroom. Get this: it's for our live-in butler, not Tiffany!! TiffanyxPlayer forever!!!