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Pigs Don't Fly #4
Dragonne's Eg
A young orphan in Victorian London, Sophie will receive a substantial legacy from her late uncle if she can successfully return a dragon's egg to an uncharted region of Asia, and armed only with a magical ring, a mysterious unicorn figure, and a telepathic cat, Sophie braves untold perils on her quest
320 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published June 1, 1999
2 people are currently reading
257 people want to read
About the author
Mary Brown
9 books72 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
January 8, 2024
Do you ever read terrible novels and stick with them to the end? Have you been happy while thinking, “This is so terrible; I know I could do better”? That’s what Dragonne’s Eg by Mary Brown put me through.
Set during Victorian times, a poor but self-sufficient teacher in London named Sophy learns that she’s now the sole heir to a tiny horse figurine and weird, sizable egg (it’s a dragon). If she can return the egg to its rightful place on the Blue Mountain in China within a year, she will inherit a country manor that would make the perfect place for an orphanage to help all the underprivileged children she teaches. To make sure she gets there in a year, her dead uncle’s lawyers send two lackeys (they had job titles, but I forgot them). The horse figurine reveals itself to be a Ky-Lin, a servant of Buddha who must help others on earth so he can return to his master. He’s magical. He’s got wicked linguistic skills and “Sleepy Dust.” And when her favorite pupil mails himself to the manor before she leaves for China, Sophy has her traveling crew.
The lackeys are easy to confuse. At first, one seemed like a version of “Rebecca’s favorite cousin,” Mr. Jack Favell. The other, more gentlemanly. But as the louse became more normal and the gentleman gambled and drank, and the two sounded the same in description and dialogue, I assumed they were twinsies. I think one may have actually been Irish.
The favorite pupil’s dialogue runs the gamut from Cockney to good grammar and back again. I know he’s in school, but he practically changes overnight into a star sentence constructor. Honestly, I confused him with the dog from previous novels in this set of books. The dog and the boy were both constantly hungry and a Mary Poppins Dick Van Dyke version of British. The dog was a favorite character of mine, but because it’s 500 years later in this last installment of Mary Brown’s quartet of books, he can’t be alive. Instead, Sophy saves a cat that claims to be a Chinese prince cursed by a witch. He’s talkative and a little sexy and he’s slowly getting larger in each chapter. These are not things cats should be or do, but Mary Brown likes animals.
Nevertheless, our heroine stands strong with dignity and conquers each challenge set in her way. We miss a lot of those challenges because the book makes huge leaps in setting and time as the crew travels from London to China by river boat and on foot. Somehow, much like in Lord of the Rings (well, the film at least — I haven’t read the books), they are able to ride a train all the way back in no time after nearly dying a hundred deaths just to get the egg home to the nearly extinct dragons.
Each of the previous novels ended rather annoyingly with one of those “Well, townspeople gossiped one thing may have happened, or it may have been this other way” sort of endings. You can hear in a wispy voice sighing, “We’ll never know. . . .” Dragonne’s Eg actually has a confirmed ending, perhaps overly saccharine, but it’s more satisfactory than Mary Brown essentially saying, “I don’t know how to end this thing! YOU do it!!”
Because this is less of a review and more a puzzle asking why I finished a terrible book, I’m going to end with a list of some reasons:
This review was originally published at Grab the Lapels
Set during Victorian times, a poor but self-sufficient teacher in London named Sophy learns that she’s now the sole heir to a tiny horse figurine and weird, sizable egg (it’s a dragon). If she can return the egg to its rightful place on the Blue Mountain in China within a year, she will inherit a country manor that would make the perfect place for an orphanage to help all the underprivileged children she teaches. To make sure she gets there in a year, her dead uncle’s lawyers send two lackeys (they had job titles, but I forgot them). The horse figurine reveals itself to be a Ky-Lin, a servant of Buddha who must help others on earth so he can return to his master. He’s magical. He’s got wicked linguistic skills and “Sleepy Dust.” And when her favorite pupil mails himself to the manor before she leaves for China, Sophy has her traveling crew.
The lackeys are easy to confuse. At first, one seemed like a version of “Rebecca’s favorite cousin,” Mr. Jack Favell. The other, more gentlemanly. But as the louse became more normal and the gentleman gambled and drank, and the two sounded the same in description and dialogue, I assumed they were twinsies. I think one may have actually been Irish.
The favorite pupil’s dialogue runs the gamut from Cockney to good grammar and back again. I know he’s in school, but he practically changes overnight into a star sentence constructor. Honestly, I confused him with the dog from previous novels in this set of books. The dog and the boy were both constantly hungry and a Mary Poppins Dick Van Dyke version of British. The dog was a favorite character of mine, but because it’s 500 years later in this last installment of Mary Brown’s quartet of books, he can’t be alive. Instead, Sophy saves a cat that claims to be a Chinese prince cursed by a witch. He’s talkative and a little sexy and he’s slowly getting larger in each chapter. These are not things cats should be or do, but Mary Brown likes animals.
Nevertheless, our heroine stands strong with dignity and conquers each challenge set in her way. We miss a lot of those challenges because the book makes huge leaps in setting and time as the crew travels from London to China by river boat and on foot. Somehow, much like in Lord of the Rings (well, the film at least — I haven’t read the books), they are able to ride a train all the way back in no time after nearly dying a hundred deaths just to get the egg home to the nearly extinct dragons.
Each of the previous novels ended rather annoyingly with one of those “Well, townspeople gossiped one thing may have happened, or it may have been this other way” sort of endings. You can hear in a wispy voice sighing, “We’ll never know. . . .” Dragonne’s Eg actually has a confirmed ending, perhaps overly saccharine, but it’s more satisfactory than Mary Brown essentially saying, “I don’t know how to end this thing! YOU do it!!”
Because this is less of a review and more a puzzle asking why I finished a terrible book, I’m going to end with a list of some reasons:
I was four books into a series, and this was the last.So, there you have it. A terrible book. I don’t recommend it (nor can I to most of you, as it’s the 4th in a series and I haven’t really “sold” Mary Brown’s work), but I do want to know what terrible books you’ve sat through entirely, either hating or enjoying the story as you did. Let me know in the comments!
I was reading to my husband, who found my voices to be a hoot. It doesn’t seem to matter what we’re reading, my husband and I look forward to it each night.
I wanted to know if the cat really was a cursed prince.
The writing, though riddled with typos and the occasional poor sentence structure, was much improved over the course of the quartet, allowing me to read faster (and thus took us less time to get through).
This all started with a novel called The Unlikely Ones, the first in the quartet, that I was assigned as an undergrad for a science fiction/fantasy class. The professor was amazingly odd and nerdy, but I respected her.
This review was originally published at Grab the Lapels
February 12, 2026
I’m not sure how to feel at the end of Dragonne’s Eg. Apparently it is the fourth in a series, though I picked up the book as a standalone (and it can be read that way as it primarily it set in a same universe hundreds of years apart rather than direct sequels).
It showed a lot of promise in the beginning. Brown’s description of Victorian London and the neighboring country is solid and lived in. Sophie is a fairly typical ingenue, but she’s got strength that makes her intriguing to follow.
But the story doesn’t properly stop until half way through the book and the pacing is all over the place. While the first half is decent slice of life it drags when knowing an “adventure” is coming. Then the second half is told primarily in summary vs scene and it felt like Brown didn’t really have her heart in it.
And for a book written in 1999, there are some bizarre stereotypes in this novel that aren’t really examined or taken apart.
It’s frustrating because Sophie, Ky-Lin, and Toby are all interesting enough characters. But the greater supporting cast are paper thin and the plot’s underdeveloped.
It showed a lot of promise in the beginning. Brown’s description of Victorian London and the neighboring country is solid and lived in. Sophie is a fairly typical ingenue, but she’s got strength that makes her intriguing to follow.
But the story doesn’t properly stop until half way through the book and the pacing is all over the place. While the first half is decent slice of life it drags when knowing an “adventure” is coming. Then the second half is told primarily in summary vs scene and it felt like Brown didn’t really have her heart in it.
And for a book written in 1999, there are some bizarre stereotypes in this novel that aren’t really examined or taken apart.
It’s frustrating because Sophie, Ky-Lin, and Toby are all interesting enough characters. But the greater supporting cast are paper thin and the plot’s underdeveloped.
November 5, 2007
This was a good mix of historical fiction and fantasy set in the late 19th century. I liked the characters Sophie, Toby and Ky-Lin. The only downside was that I sometimes got annoyed at Sophie when she seemed to forget about the magic she learned and would think that she was dreaming. Now, to find the first three books of the Pigs Don't Fly series: The Unlikely Ones, Pigs Don't Fly and Master of Many Treasures.
May 16, 2024
Dragonne’s Eg follows Sophie, a young teacher in the late 1800s London, who must undergo an adventure to deliver a dragon’s egg to its rightful place in China in order to inherit an estate from a previously unknown relative. She undertakes this adventure with an array of colorful companions, including a young London street urchin, a cat that claims to be a prince, and a mythical Qilin. I surprisingly enjoyed this novel, despite not realizing it was the fourth book in a quartet, and found it an easy-going and relaxing read. However, the story did leave things left to be desired.
As mentioned before, this was an easy book to read and rather relaxing. It comes across more like a travelogue. I enjoyed Sophie’s perspective and narrative. I liked Ky-lin’s character the most, and the rest of the traveling party was fine. The novel has a slow pace, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. The quest doesn’t pick up until midway through the novel, and the story from there tended to skip to moments on the journey when action occurred. Weirdly, I maybe enjoyed the first half of the novel more with the world building and setting the scene.
Again, I definitely didn’t realize that this was book four of a series, but I liked that the book felt stand alone and self-contained. I appreciated not being punished for starting at the end of the series. That said, I’ve gone back and double checked, there is nothing about this being the fourth book in a series anywhere on the book, but I probably should have picked up on it earlier with Goodreads saying it was the fourth book in the Pigs Don’t Fly quartet …
I think this book suffers in two regards – tension and character development. In terms of tension, there really isn’t much danger or impetus in the novel (besides the seemingly artificial deadline of the egg needing to be delivered in a year’s time). There is no villain or antagonist, and to be honest, most of the peril the characters face is rather self-induced (the sledding accident, the avalanche). As a result, the novel felt rather low stakes, which is perhaps why I described it earlier as a travelogue. I think it would have been helpful for there to be some sort of antagonistic force or to have made the deadline more pressing and looming. I feel a book like Legends and Lattes, by Travis Baldree, does a better job at establishing low stakes, but still letting there be tension and rising action.
The second quibble I have with the novel is the character development. While Sophie somewhat changes over the course of the novel (she wears pants and throws away her old clothing, I suppose), the surrounding cast of characters provide color at best. Claude and Danny serve as side characters and comic relief, but offer very little depth. The two proposing to Sophie was entertaining, but way out of nowhere. Toby was interesting at the start of the novel, but once the journey goes underway isn’t fleshed out. Beau-cat appears out of nowhere, and suddenly there is romance between him and the main character? I feel like the book engaged in telling instead of showing, and I wish the relationships and character dynamics had been fleshed out. You would think traveling across two continents would give time for that, but I guess not.
Overall, I enjoyed this book more than expected, but it’s a solid middle of the road book. Perhaps I would have thought differently if I had read all the prequel books. I feel a little deceived by the cover (and the excerpt on the first page of the book) – no dragons are encountered until the epilogue really. That said, the dragon egg is the plot device that moved the novel along. Perhaps someday I’ll bump this book to a 4/5, but I think a 3/5 rating is fine for now.
As mentioned before, this was an easy book to read and rather relaxing. It comes across more like a travelogue. I enjoyed Sophie’s perspective and narrative. I liked Ky-lin’s character the most, and the rest of the traveling party was fine. The novel has a slow pace, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. The quest doesn’t pick up until midway through the novel, and the story from there tended to skip to moments on the journey when action occurred. Weirdly, I maybe enjoyed the first half of the novel more with the world building and setting the scene.
Again, I definitely didn’t realize that this was book four of a series, but I liked that the book felt stand alone and self-contained. I appreciated not being punished for starting at the end of the series. That said, I’ve gone back and double checked, there is nothing about this being the fourth book in a series anywhere on the book, but I probably should have picked up on it earlier with Goodreads saying it was the fourth book in the Pigs Don’t Fly quartet …
I think this book suffers in two regards – tension and character development. In terms of tension, there really isn’t much danger or impetus in the novel (besides the seemingly artificial deadline of the egg needing to be delivered in a year’s time). There is no villain or antagonist, and to be honest, most of the peril the characters face is rather self-induced (the sledding accident, the avalanche). As a result, the novel felt rather low stakes, which is perhaps why I described it earlier as a travelogue. I think it would have been helpful for there to be some sort of antagonistic force or to have made the deadline more pressing and looming. I feel a book like Legends and Lattes, by Travis Baldree, does a better job at establishing low stakes, but still letting there be tension and rising action.
The second quibble I have with the novel is the character development. While Sophie somewhat changes over the course of the novel (she wears pants and throws away her old clothing, I suppose), the surrounding cast of characters provide color at best. Claude and Danny serve as side characters and comic relief, but offer very little depth. The two proposing to Sophie was entertaining, but way out of nowhere. Toby was interesting at the start of the novel, but once the journey goes underway isn’t fleshed out. Beau-cat appears out of nowhere, and suddenly there is romance between him and the main character? I feel like the book engaged in telling instead of showing, and I wish the relationships and character dynamics had been fleshed out. You would think traveling across two continents would give time for that, but I guess not.
Overall, I enjoyed this book more than expected, but it’s a solid middle of the road book. Perhaps I would have thought differently if I had read all the prequel books. I feel a little deceived by the cover (and the excerpt on the first page of the book) – no dragons are encountered until the epilogue really. That said, the dragon egg is the plot device that moved the novel along. Perhaps someday I’ll bump this book to a 4/5, but I think a 3/5 rating is fine for now.
October 2, 2022
Sophie was orphaned at a young age and works in a poor house school as a teacher. Paid very little in a London slum area but finding out that she was left something of an inheritance by her grandfather. She can choose the 500 pounds or by completing his quest of returning an Eg to China. She reads her Grandfather's journal and discovers that he was an explorer and an adventurer who regretted taking a Dragonne's Eg from it's nest and must be returned to it's nest in order to hatch. As she prepares for the journey she meets and rescues a talking cat, a statue that comes to life but can come to life and is able to help her on her journey that will take over a year to complete along with one of her students and a man that was the person to locate her for the lawyer assigned to the task of finding her. This is quite the adventure and she must trust her instincts and her fellow travelers to get the Eg returned to hatching ground. A bit confusing at times but it kept me interested the entire tale!
March 21, 2025
I liked this book soooooo much better than the previous 2 books (Pigs Don’t Fly & Master of Many Treasures). The characters were much more likable & I was happy that they succeeded on their quest & had a happy ending.
January 21, 2019
Good enough to keep me reading but overall it felt like a rehash of the previous books, just with different characters.
March 25, 2014
Initially interesting (yet eye-rolling) because it features the trope of the young, orphaned, penniless school teacher in Victorian England ... it takes what also looks like an intriguing turn.
Sophie learns she has inherited a house or perhaps a bit of money from an uncle she didn't know she had. Of course.
And then is pitted on a yearlong adventure to return a dragon's egg, an artifact that her uncle had once taken.
She also is forced to take two unpleasant men with her as proof of her making the trip, along with a magical animal, kin to the dragon but not, a bit like a scaly unicorn, Ky-Lin. She also picks up a Siamese cat along the way, one that claims to be a human prince.
We follow her trials and tribulations of the journey, but it seems very cliched and trite. I was quite happy to be finished with the book.
Of course, she also falls in love along the way. I won't say with which companion, but you can bet it's one of her companions. Ugh.
She also returns to a frankly pedestrian destiny.
This book was pretty disappointing, considering I'd first read The Unlikely Ones a long time ago, when I was a kid. Whether seen through the lens of time or actually being a better book ... The Unlikely Ones is a much better book. Yes, there's a journey, yes, there's magical creatures. But it felt far less trite.
I'm not likely to try to read any of the rest of the books in the series. Especially since you get some idea of what happened in a previous book, with a heroine whose name was Summer. Really? Summer? And then the Sophie of this book has some ridiculously long name.
Meh. Just glad I'm done.
Sophie learns she has inherited a house or perhaps a bit of money from an uncle she didn't know she had. Of course.
And then is pitted on a yearlong adventure to return a dragon's egg, an artifact that her uncle had once taken.
She also is forced to take two unpleasant men with her as proof of her making the trip, along with a magical animal, kin to the dragon but not, a bit like a scaly unicorn, Ky-Lin. She also picks up a Siamese cat along the way, one that claims to be a human prince.
We follow her trials and tribulations of the journey, but it seems very cliched and trite. I was quite happy to be finished with the book.
Of course, she also falls in love along the way. I won't say with which companion, but you can bet it's one of her companions. Ugh.
She also returns to a frankly pedestrian destiny.
This book was pretty disappointing, considering I'd first read The Unlikely Ones a long time ago, when I was a kid. Whether seen through the lens of time or actually being a better book ... The Unlikely Ones is a much better book. Yes, there's a journey, yes, there's magical creatures. But it felt far less trite.
I'm not likely to try to read any of the rest of the books in the series. Especially since you get some idea of what happened in a previous book, with a heroine whose name was Summer. Really? Summer? And then the Sophie of this book has some ridiculously long name.
Meh. Just glad I'm done.
July 15, 2014
I decided to ask myself why I'm reading each of my books and no answer about this book satisfied me besides "I've always liked sci-fi/fantasy and that's what this is!"
I also see it's fourth in a series, so besides the maleficent quality of the number I don't have the background of the series to understand what she's trying to say. Some books, like of Terry Pratchett or perhaps J.K. Rowling, are suitable to read even out of order (I read HP 2-3-4-1-5-6-7), but some are not. This may fall in the latter category.
This also proves I don't love every book, even if I've been praising the past couple I finished. So this is going back soon.
I also see it's fourth in a series, so besides the maleficent quality of the number I don't have the background of the series to understand what she's trying to say. Some books, like of Terry Pratchett or perhaps J.K. Rowling, are suitable to read even out of order (I read HP 2-3-4-1-5-6-7), but some are not. This may fall in the latter category.
This also proves I don't love every book, even if I've been praising the past couple I finished. So this is going back soon.
November 18, 2013
This is an adventure story of a young school marm who inherits a dragon's egg, a carved statue and unicorn horn ring with mystical powers. To be able to received the mansion and all that comes with it, she must return the egg to China by the years end. Characters are great with awesome story line.
April 21, 2015
This portion of the story resumes after hundreds of years. The heroine and Toby do make interesting characters and the return of other elements of original artifacts adds to the variety; this book pales in complexity to its forerunners.
May 7, 2010
Loved the heroine's and the fantasy story of the witches and how they lived. Filled with battles and a love story.
September 11, 2014
This story is told in the manner of Hans Christian Anderson and the Brothers Grimm but with Alderney sensibility. Lovely.
July 14, 2013
This is one of my favorite books of all times. I really loves the characters and the plot is interesting
November 23, 2014
A brilliant finish to a quartet of fantasy/fairy tales.
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December 8, 2017
I love this book! I re-read it every year, usually curled up on a blanket in a sunny park. Miss Sophronisbe Lee is the heroine of my heart. She's good, so very good, without being pretentious. I love her dedication to teaching the children in London's slums and I commiserate with her practical mind-set. I'm also so in love with her love of books. Watching Sophie have her own dragon inspired adventure warms my heart as does her slow romance.
The supporting characters are all well fleshed out and indeed, almost seem like main characters themselves. Ky-Lin has a whole back-story that I desperately want to read about. Toby Jugg is an inspiration and watching the friendship grow between Sophie, Claude, Danny, and Beau is perfection.
There are amazing descriptions of food and often I find myself hungry after reading. Also, there are dragons!
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews