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    Dealing with Dragons
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    Dealing with Dragons
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    Dealing with Dragons
    Audiobook4 hours

    Dealing with Dragons

    Written by Patricia C. Wrede

    Narrated by Full Cast

    4.5/5

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    Currently unavailable

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    About this audiobook

    Princess Cimerone and the dragon Kazul share a spirited adventure with an extraordinary cast of characters in this first book in the Enchanted Forest Chronicles series.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPenguin Random House Audio
    Release dateSep 23, 2003
    ISBN9781400085705
    Author

    Patricia C. Wrede

    PATRICIA COLLINS WREDE was born in Chicago, the oldest of five children.  She attended Carleton College in Minnesota, where she majored in biology and managed to avoid taking any English courses.  She began work on her first novel, Shadow Magic (1982), after graduation, though it took her five years to finish it.  Ms. Wrede enjoyed a successful career as a financial analyst, but she always made time to write.  Her published books now total more than a dozen.

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    Reviews for Dealing with Dragons

    4.5/5

    1,487 ratings86 reviews

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    • 2/5
      Eh, I guess it's fine. It's short anyway. A woman who doesn't want to be a proper princess leaves the castle. She wants to learn fencing and performing, but they won't let her. So she finds some dragons to capture her as a fair maiden. The kind you rescue if any male in this story was capable. What this really means is she becomes a maid, doing dragon stuff like polishing the gold hoard, making breakfast, and handling appointments. So much for feminism.To be honest, I didn't think there was much there. Not enough to recommend it. It's got a few funny moments, but I find comedy in books comes greatly from the absurd. And this isn't it. I think this might even be more of a prequel or setup to some other book. I like my stories with a little more substance than twee charm. Like Diana Wynne Jones lite. Nothing seemed to matter to anyone. It was just a few trite "stronger princess than prince" jokes. As if fairy tale maidens have never broken the mold before.
    • 5/5
      Tired of life as a princess, with all of its rules and traditions, Cimorene runs away to be a dragon's princess, and finds herself much more suited to that life. While in the caves of the dragon Kazul, Cimorene uncovers a plot by the Society of Wizards, and befriends a witch, a fellow captive princess, and a prince who has been partially turned to stone.This is an old favorite of mine, one I turn to when I need a light read that I am sure to enjoy. It always does the trick. If you're a fan of humorous, fairy-tale-inspired fantasy, I recommend this book.
    • 5/5
      The Enchanted Forest Chronicles are a different sort of fairy tale! A princess runs away from her kingdom (and an arranged marriage) to become a "dragon's princess." Very funny series!
    • 4/5
      This is definitely younger than books I typically read (middle reader rather than YA) but lots of fun and that main character is awesome. Highly recommended for middle readers of all ages.
    • 4/5
      Funny, and it's awesome.
    • 5/5
      YA subversion of many standard YA fantasy tropes. Feminist AF, too, which is excellent.
    • 5/5
      The Enchanted Forest Chronicles are a different sort of fairy tale! A princess runs away from her kingdom (and an arranged marriage) to become a "dragon's princess." Very funny series!
    • 4/5
      This book somehow isn't quite as much fun now as it was when I was a kid, but it is still entertaining. I can definitely see why I loved it back then: a strong independent female protagonist with attitude, a spot of satire involving fairy tale tropes, and a fantasy story involving dragons and wizards all combine quite well into an entertaining final product written for young readers.
    • 4/5
      What a delightful and fun book.

      Princess Cimorene is the youngest Princess in her family and of the Kingdom Linderwell, she is also the most improper! She has absolutely no interest in: marrying a prince, learning etiquette, needle work, dancing, or fashion. She is, however, interested in: Latin, magic, fencing, cooking and other useful but intellectual pursuits.

      Upon learning that she is to be engaged, Cimorene decides to run away and join the dragons... Into the Enchanted Forest and the Dragons' Caves she meets Kazul the wisest & most powerful of Dragons and becomes Kazul's Princess. Working for Kazul, Cimorene puts her knowledge & intellect to work. She cooks, organizes Kazul's treasury & library, fends off princes sent to "rescue" her, learns magic and outwits the evil Wizards who are out to take over the Dragons' empire.

      This was a fast & easy read... No, it is not "Great Literature", but it is fun and enchanting.... so much so that I'm going to read the next book in the series. I'm also now willing to read the author's YA books as well.
    • 3/5
      Princesses are often kidnapped by dragons, but they've never volunteered before - nor shunned rescuing princes. But Cimerone has been breaking the princess mold her entire life. This was cute. May pick up the second book in the series next time I search my library in vain for a happy/light read.
    • 5/5
      I wanted to re-read an old favorite and I found this at a thrift store. I love this book! Cimorene is a kick butt heroine. I love how Patricia Wrede flips the classic princess and knight tropes on their head! I want Cimorene to be my best friend
    • 5/5
      Fun and quick read. nice break from reading something heavy. very good storytelling.
    • 4/5
      Fun book to read.
    • 4/5
      A young princess who doesn't play by the normal princess rules voluntarily offers herself up to a dragon as her cook and finds herself helping put down a dragon/wizard rebellion. I like the idea (strong girl characters are awesome, of course), and it was a fun story, but I won't continue with the series, at least for now. Note: I think I might have enjoyed it more had I read it myself instead of listening to the audiobook version - the readers were awful with raisins, and so I suspect that the writing wasn't quite as not-good as it seemed.
    • 5/5
      Cimorene is not your traditional princess. She wants to learn magic or cooking or something useful, but her options are limited unless she feels like getting married - and she doesn't, at least not right now. So she decides to volunteer as a dragon's princess instead.I really enjoyed the humor and the way the author plays with the conventions of the fantasy genre in this tale. Cimorene is her own person: smart, practical, maybe a bit tomboyish but she also likes to cook. She makes friends with her dragon, Kazul, and doesn't want the bother of would-be rescuing knights. Fun to read or as a readaloud, and enough to hold the interest of a wide age range.
    • 4/5
      A fun feminist twist on classic fairy tales.
    • 5/5
      I think all readers have books from their childhood that they can point to and say "that's who I am" or "that made me". For me, this is that book. It's the story of a princess who doesn't much like being a princess. She doesn't like being proper or doing what she'd meant to do. So, instead of marrying the prince and liveing happily ever after she runs of into the mountains to become a dragon's princess and ends up saveing the dragons from the wizards evil plot. The first thing I'll say for it is that it was amazing as a child when I read it a million times, curled up in my bed at night. It was also amazing when I read it as an adult. I'm 25 now so, ok, maybe I've got a way to go but I've put of re-reading this for years in case it turns out that my interpretation of this book at 12 was flawed somehow and, reading it as an adult, I'd hate it. I don't, it's still great. What really makes the book, as far as I'm concerned, is Cimoren, the main character. She doesn't have a love interest, nor does she seem interested in one. She's intelligent, quick witted and does what she wants, not what anyone else wants her too. She also consistent and well drawn out, which is important in a character. I'm not sure what else I can say about this book. It was my childhood so I'm biased but I think I turned out ok so the book's ok by me.
    • 5/5
      very enjoyable. a children's book to be sure. the full cast is excellent.
    • 5/5
      Loved it, and can't wait to listen to more !
    • 3/5
      The storyline is wonderful, and having a full cast performing an unabridged version was certainly interesting, but honestly, the performances were not very good. I kept thinking that they reeeeally needed a better Director, to tell them "you need to sound more excited" or "you're supposed to be scared" or "sorry, can you run that scene again, this time with emphasis on [word], please?", etc. Shoddy stuff...
    • 4/5
      Oh, I like a story that starts by dissing your typical princess, and moves right on to a spunky, intelligent heroine, who happens to be disadvantaged by her birth. Princess Cimorene would rather be eaten by dragons than marry an eligible prince, so to the dragons she goes when threatened by this horrible fate. Fresh, funny and self-respecting, and a main character with an organizational bent – love it!
    • 5/5
      I found this book shortly after I'd moved to Massachusetts. My family was driving down to Pennsylvania to see our extended family and we stopped somewhere along the way for lunch at a restaurant/diner (where, by the way, I had my first heavenly tuna melt sandwich (none of this open-face nonsense that they do in NYC) on pumpernickel) and the basement was absolutely stuffed, wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling, narrow corridors between shelves, with used books for sale. I have no idea how I managed to find this one among everything else, or how I managed to limit myself to one book, given the prices, but somehow I did...and this was one of those serendipitous jewels of a story that surprised me with how much I enjoyed it.Cimorene is a genre-savvy youngest princess who finds her life incredibly boring. She'd rather learn fencing, cooking, Latin, and magic, than protocol, dancing, manners, and embroidery. When she learns that her family are planning to marry her off, she decides to run away, following the advice of a talking frog (who picked up a few things from the princes he'd met) straight into a cave full of dragons...where she presents herself as a willing princess. The dragon Kazul, amused by her pluck and enticed by her ability to make cherries jubilee, takes her on to cook, clean and rearrange the treasury, and organize the library. Adventures large and small ensue as Cimorene learns how to navigate dragon society, deflects unwanted knights determined to rescue her, tolerates and befriends other dragons' princesses, and works with Kazul to uncover a dastardly wizard plot. There are cat-loving witches, stone princes who ought to have known better, jinns reluctant to implement curses, and dragons allergic to wizard staffs; there are dragon feasts and feats of strength, magic spells and potions, enchanted forests, and practical applications of wishes, soapy water, and magic feathers. Cimorene's level-headedness and sensibility shock and impress, and even the more princess-y things she had to learn come in handy. Dealing with Dragons is a fast-paced adventure full of humor, clever nods to fairy tales, imaginative use of tropes, and casually placed women of power. Appropriate for kids but also likely to delight high schoolers and adults. Highly recommended.Quotesp 97) An example of Cimerone's genre-savviness. I feel like these days authors would have her lift the spell, but where's the fun in that?Cimorene felt better knowing that the princes would someday be freed, though she had sense enough not to try doing it herself. Since she had not been sent on a quest for the Water of Healing, it was highly unlikely that she would be able to disenchant the princess even if she succeeded in taking the water. And she knew enough about quests and enchantments and the obtaining of things with magical properties to know that she would probably get into a lot of trouble if she tried.p 166) "Tokoz drank Turkish coffee every morning. The stuff is strong enough to take the roof off your mouth. That's why no one ever went to talk to him over breakfast." ... Cimorene tried to imagine coffee, even Turkish coffee, strong enough to take the roof off a dragon's mouth and failed.This bit tickled me because my mother-in-law drinks something pretty much equivalent...at least three times a day.
    • 4/5
      Found all four at a used-book store, and enjoyed the first enough to start the second. However, I get the feeling that they're four stand-alone stories set in the same world - and since I tire of series like this, I'll likely not finish them all. But I did like the humor, the relatively mild adventure & easy intrigue, the world-building, and the creative characters.

      Well, if you can't find any hens' teeth, you could try substituting snake fingernails or the hair from a turtle's egg.""
    • 4/5
      This was a cute young adult fantasy novel about an unusual princess. The characters were humorous and I enjoyed reading the story. The plot wasn't overly predictable and the ending was not what I expected. I am happy to find out this is a trilogy and I'm anxiously waiting my turn on the library holds list.
    • 3/5
      I listened to an unabridged dramatisation of this.Cimorene has no interest in being a traditional princess, and when her parents attempt to arrange a suitable marriage for her, she defies convention by running away and volunteering to becomes a dragon’s princess. It turns out to be a job that suits her perfectly, even if princes keep turning up to rescue her and there are wizards snooping around.Dealing with Dragons combines dragons with the of subversion of fairytale tropes, so I’m not sure why I never became more invested. I don’t know if this was due to the dramatisation - some of the voices annoyed me - or the story itself - Cimorene is so capable and content with her circumstances it’s hard to connect with her - or if is one of those books I would have appreciated more fifteen years ago.
    • 3/5
      I've long been wanting to reread Patricia Wrede's Enchanted Forest Chronicles. I read them as a child and was just not being impressed (and actually took a little offense here and there). But since that time I've been assured that I must have missed the fact that it's a parody of fairy tale conventions, and that it really is a fun and rewarding little fantasy series. I've been collecting the volumes secondhand to reread all at once, and finally got my hands on the last one I was missing.Sometimes, you should just trust yourself as a child. You had less clouding your brain. The plot is fairly simple. Princess Cimorene runs away from a boring arranged marriage, volunteering to be a dragon's princess instead. Unfortunately all the knights in the area want to rescue Cimorene, but she's quite happy where she is, making cherries jubilee and keeping house for her dragon Kazul. But soon troublesome knights become the least of Cimorene's worries, when the wizards start plotting to steal the dragons' magic by assassinating the King of the Dragons and rigging the trials that determine the next King. I guess there is a cuteness to the story and it's fun to see certain fairytale conventions subverted. But there's something almost bitter about the way Wrede satirizes them. Maybe that's why I never loved these books as a child. The Enchanted Forest series exists in the context of fantasy literature, but it's merciless toward its own tradition. Maybe I'm overstating — some of the parody is quite fun — but this underlying arrogance bothered me enough to reaffirm my childhood impressions. It isn't that I don't like Wrede; I quite enjoyed her Sorcery & Cecelia series. Oddly enough, I've gone on with the Enchanted Forest Chronicles. They're short and easy reads, and I was amused enough to keep going. But I don't think I'll be rereading them. Meh.
    • 5/5
      "Well, I'm not a proper princess, then," Cimorene snapped. "I make cherries jubilee, and I volunteer for dragons, and I conjugate Latin verbs-or at least I would if anyone would let me. So there!"A princess who refuses to be proper and runs away to live with dragons? Sign me up! Combine this with turning fairy tale tropes on their head and a dash of humor and you have Dealing with Dragons, the first book in the Enchanted Forest Chronicles by Patricia C. Wrede. I wish I'd discovered this series as a kid. It would easily be a childhood favorite. I never knew I wanted to be Cimorene when I grew up. She doesn't let society's expectations of what a princess should be get in the way of living the life she wants. Organizing her dragon's treasure, cooking and fencing are much preferable to being a damsel in distress to be rescued by knights. In fact Cimorene has to keep turning the knights away so she can stay a dragon's princess. They are such a nuisance! Cimorene is courageous, witty, a creative problem solver and learns how to work as a team to accomplish her goals. It's a great message.Plot wise, there is a mystery to solve. As a story aimed at a middle-grade audience it's not overly complex though Wrede manages to add a couple twists that keep things from being too predictable. There is plenty of action, the story is fast paced and plenty of sly humor to go around.There is something magical about Dealing with Dragons. It's one of those books that as soon as I finished I couldn't wait to read it again. I'm looking forward to the rest of the series.
    • 3/5
      Actual score - 3.5 out of 5Dealing with Dragons is a short and cheerful children's story that I'd definitely recommend for younger readers. The story is upbeat and packed with humorous dialogue, presenting a lovely adventure story about a girl who just didn't want to be a princess. The story has aged very well and is still relevant twenty-six years after its initial publication, even if it is now not as groundbreaking as it once may have been.The novel was brimming with charm and took a number of cute digs at traditional children's faerie stories. Characters were so set in their fantasy roles that they didn't really know how to react to Cimorene - the princess who turned her back on the tropes and refused to do things just because they were deemed "proper".While the story is perfectly enjoyable for a light read, it doesn't really offer much by the way of depth. The world building is a knowing nod to typical high fantasy, character motivation is pretty shallow and problems are resolved swiftly through luck rather than skill. I also felt at times that Cimorene could have done more to claim her independence than give up being a princess to become a "dragon's princess".However, books don't need to be complex to be entertaining and this is definitely one that I'd recommend to fantasy-loving middle graders (and the young at heart).
    • 4/5
      Princess Cimorene has had it with all the rules about proper behavior and occupation - that's just boring. Anything she likes doing - cooking, fencing, Latin is not allowed. And to top it all her parents want to marry her to a prince who doesn't suit her at all. So she decides to volunteer to be a dragon's princess. That life suits her so much better - except for the annoying princes that want to rescue her and those pesky wizards with their nefarious plans.

      This is a fresh take on all those traditional rules of princesses and knights in shining armor to the rescue. The elements of traditional fairy tales are all there - yet nothing is really the way it ought to be. Very enjoyable.
    • 5/5
      This book sparked joy in me. Will definitely recommend to kids.