Okay, so dragons are oppressive, tyrannical, conquesting aliens who train at academies on their home planet of Blegwethia to prepare them for their career as world conquerors. From the very beginning, their stats are everything. They have to work on building their Bio Con levels, such as Flight Speed, Strategic Destruction Capability, Mating Magnetism and, above all else, Will To Power, only the most important Bio Con stat of them all. Mind you, the Mating Magnetism is kinda important, too, since the end of their academic career is the Egg Harvest ritual, whereby male dragons have to find a female dragon who agrees to be their queen and lay their eggs. If they don't find someone to accept their crown, they end up becoming slaves for the rest of their lives. I guess you could say it's sort of a pass/fail system.
At any rate, Gork: The Teenage Dragon appears to be an autobiography by Gork "Weak Sauce" The Terrible, but I suspect that it was ghostwritten by Gabe Hudson, the human author, since his name and picture appear on the cover. Gork's story is not typical of his kind, from a unique parentage to the situation surrounding his unlikely survival during his early childhood and, finally, to his attempt to carry on his family's legacy, one which isn't a traditional one, for the universe-conquering dragons. As I understand it, Gork felt that the story of his adventure was exciting and noteworthy enough that it should probably be written down for the benefit of others - and he also hoped that it might help set the record straight for any humans who had any aforementioned ill-conceived notions of dragons, based on silly books such as Beowulf or anything by that J.R.R. Tolkien guy. Perhaps it was more of a licensing deal and he just presented the story. Gabe Hudson, I mean, not the Tolkien guy. It just really reads like it was written by a teenage dragon.
Sometimes, writing the important stuff down is the most important thing, and Gork tries to include his entire story, just in case. However, as is the case with a lot of teenagers these days, Gork seems to be a bit ADD, so from time to time, he gets a bit... distracted... and might ramble on about some aside to the action at hand. This can be especially unnerving when the aside occurs right smack in the middle of some extremely deranged action, such as when Gork is trying to escape certain death or whatnot. Also, there's the lingo. Teens almost seem to have their own language, and teen dragons are no different. Everyone's "deranged" or "monstrous" or "straight nightmare." Kids. I guess it's also Gork's age that leads to chapter titles such as "Enter My Secret Weapon, Which Will Help Me Get On With The Business of Having Runcita Lay My Eggs" or "Rexro Goes Full Psycho, Plus What Happens When I Encountered A Mysterious Wormhole."
Yes, the writing is a bit unfocused, at times, and there are some times when Gork seems to find something important that we, humans, might not find as interesting (such as the time he used about one full page to detail exactly what it sounded like for him to fly across campus), but overall, I did find Gork: The Teenage Dragon to be an entertaining read. And... if you're not careful, you may learn something about how someone's weakness can be their strength... or that time travel can be addictive... or something about robotic dragons or something. Look, just be careful. That's all I'm saying.
