Guest post written by Dragon Girl and the Awakened Flames author Jenny Moore
Jenny Moore is a novelist and children’s author from Devon. She was the first UK winner of the Commonwealth Short Story Competition and was shortlisted for the James Reckitt Hull Children’s Book Award and the Greenhouse Funny Prize. Her numerous children’s books (writing as Jenny Moore) are published by Maverick Arts Publishing, New Frontier Publishing and ZunTold. Her psychological thrillers The Woman Before and The Wilderness Retreat are published by HQ Digital, HarperCollins.
About Dragon Girl and the Awakened Flames: An orphan girl discovers she has dragon blood―the key to immortality. Hunted by an evil necromancer, she must learn to control her emerging powers if she is going to stop him. Out March 3rd 2026.
As a child, I thought of dragons as villainous creatures in dark caves, guarding their glittering treasure from pesky passing knights and brave questing heroes (both human and hobbit). And when those dragons did venture out, it was usually to steal sheep and princesses, or to burn down a neighbouring village, before suffering an ignominious defeat at the sharp end of a sword. Dragons were the fire-breathing Goliath figures in so many of the stories I grew up with, waiting to be vanquished by plucky, adventure-seeking protagonists. But not anymore. There’s no hiding away in the shadows for today’s dragons. They’re stars of the show in their own right, blazing their way into the bestseller charts, scooping up fans and awards instead of bleating sheep and wailing royals. And there’s no need for today’s adventure-seekers to traverse dark cavernous lairs in search of these mythical beasts. They need only visit their nearest bookstore to discover entire flights of dragons soaring freely amongst the literary treasures displayed on tables and shelves, their mighty wings spanning both the children’s and adult sections.
There’s no denying that these other-worldly fire-breathing creatures are hot property right now, but what is it about dragons that make them so popular with readers across the board, from fantastic picture books such as Devin Elle Kurtz’s The Bakery Dragon to Rebecca Yarros’s bestselling romantasy Fourth Wing?
A dragon certainly brings drama and danger to a story. It brings magic and mystery and exoticism, lifting us out of our own humdrum lives with the merest flick of its tail and its first fiery roar. Although I loved dreaming up weird and wonderful fauna and flora to populate my middle grade fantasy, from razor-toothed magpikes and swarms of beaming wish bugs to vicious snare roots and snapping witch ferns, nothing beats a dragon.
A dragon can be a powerful signifier of genre, an instantly recognizable symbol of the fantasy world, but precisely because it belongs to imaginary worlds beyond ours, there are no limits on its potential characteristics: big, small, horned, multi-headed (multi-tailed even), good, bad, wild, tamed, funny, protagonist, antagonist… the list goes on. Dragons can take on any number of different roles, which is what makes them so special. Yes, a dragon might be a traditional Smaug-like villain, but it can also be a hero, like the dragonet protagonists in Tui T. Sutherland’s middle grade Wings of Fire series, or a hunted victim in need of protection. A dragon can be a vehicle for a Viking (once suitably trained by the likes of Cressida Cowell’s hapless Hiccup) or a potential weapon-in waiting, like the aerimander egg in Lily Berlin Dodd’s The Last Ember. Struan Murray’s Dragonborn, meanwhile, presents dragons living amongst us in human form, unaware of their true nature until something awakens it.
For older readers too, dragons can be anything from unusual pets, like the visitors to The Baby Dragon Cafe by A. T. Qureshi, to invaluable weapons in an epic game of thrones, as well as bringing symbolic fire and passion to stories of romantic desire. Dragons add a cinematic, larger than life element to any story, regardless of their role in the narrative and the intended readership. They also look amazing on front covers!
I fell in love with David Dean’s cover illustration for Dragon Girl and the Awakened Flames, the moment I saw that majestic, fire-breathing dragon filling the sky. The dragon is the catalyst for my hero Emba’s epic adventures, upending her entire world from its first appearance at her cave in ghostly spirit form. It’s both otherworldly and unknown – an ‘impossible creature’ from the sealed off dragon realm above – and, at another level, as familiar to Emba as the pouch of protective magic toenails she wears around her neck. The toenails, it has to be said, don’t scream ‘cover star’ in quite the same way as the dragon does though!
Emba has grown up dreaming of a huge, roaring fire-breather who swoops into her sleeping mind each night with a wild beating of its bone-threaded wings and a sharp flash of gleaming talons. She’s grown up with the stigma of blue scales on her arms and legs too, and an unlocatable sense of otherness. But the revelation that she hatched out of a dragon’s egg – that she is herself, half-dragon – still comes as a shock, causing her to question her very identity. Discovering that an evil necromancer is after her dragon blood is even more of a shock.
For Emba, her dragon side is both a blessing and a curse. But for me, as the author, it was a gift, offering a unique way of exploring issues around identity and growing up, as well as providing my hero with hidden depths and powers. These powers emerge gradually throughout the Dragon Girl series, starting with Emba’s own awakening flames. Everyone loves a brave, passionate hero with metaphorical fire in their belly, but how much better is a hero with literal fire in her belly?
For me, the word ‘dragon’ no longer conjures up images of villainous creatures in caves. Instead, it reminds me of my own dragon girl, who leaves the safety of her cave for the dangerous quest of a lifetime. I hope Emba’s epic story takes off and soars, bringing fresh dragon-wonder to young adventure-seekers everywhere.
