Lyf has been a pampered, special, coddled girl all her life, and even though she is twelve, she knows she escaped from death once, and should be extra, super-duper totally… careful. Her mother enforces this, making sure that no one taxes her strength. She is fearful and small… and confused. Dark scares her. Noises scare her. The forest scares her. Yet, people around her do brave things all the time. Her foster sister, Kaeldra has been gone from home for weeks, helping to take hatching dragons to adult dragons away from human realms. But as long as dragons roam free anywhere, Kaeldra, her husband Jeorg, and their bright green-eyed child, Owyn are in danger, and so are their dragons. And so is Lyf, for her bright-green eyes betray the truth: she is dragon-touched.
When Kaeldra and her family are betrayed by Lyf’s sister’s husband, it is only by chance that Lyf and two-year-old Owyn are in a cave. They hide, cowering, as strong men take Kaeldra away for the bounty upon her head, but by chance they stumble upon what the bounty hunters are really seeking — a clutch of thirteen dragonlets. Lyf just wants someone else to take care of her, to take care of Owyn, and to keep her safe. It takes all her courage to find theSign of the Dove and people to take them to safety. But… there isn’t anybody to help them for long. In the end, all that’s left is …Lyf.
These three books have the strong theme often lacking in fantasy of a female character helping herself. Nobody saves the day except by her own ingenuity. Though Susan Fletcher neatly ties each tale with a happy ending, and in most cases, with a handsome man waiting to marry the doughty girls, she never loses her focus on the girl’s shifting for themselves, which is good and rare, and makes these books a good read.
