How to Train Your Dragon: How to Twist a Dragon's Tale

My 7 year old absolutely loves this series and has been tearing through them with reckless abandon.

I agree with all the other glowing reviews for this series, and have to add this as well: don't miss the audio versions of these stories!! They are wonderfully engaging audiobooks read with delightful enthusiasm by none other than David Tennant. His character voices are hilarious! He gives 110% in the reading of these fun tales, diving right into them with gleeful abandon that children everywhere will find very entertaining. I can't recommend the audiobooks highly enough. If you enjoyed reading these, try listening to them. You won't be disappointed!

Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III is a young bumbling and reluctant hero. He seems to have quite a knack for stumbling across adventures in which he somehow manages to beat the bad guy. In this fifth adventure, Hiccup determines that thousands of highly deadly Exterminator dragons will be hatched if the volcano on a nearby island erupts. Hiccup, his friends, and his dragons must find away to stop the volcano from erupting, and do it fast. Can even Hiccup stop an erupting volcano or has he finally met his match? Hiccups adventures are highly entertaining, especially for little boys who love adventure and fantasy. Each book stands alone as each contains a separate adventure. There are references to other adventures but you do not have to have read those books in order to follow the current tale. The book isn't just for little boys but the language and names of the characters are particularly appealing to little boys who find any reference to body functions very humorous. For example, the boy's pirate training instructor is named Gobber the Belch and some of Hiccup's classmates are named Fishlegs, Snotface Snotlout, Tuffnut Junior, and Dogsbreath the Duhbrain. The book is written as a kind of journal of Hiccup's adventures and is heavily illustrated by the Viking child's drawings. I enjoyed the book and this series has my ten-year-old son thinking maybe he could write a book like this (with his own adventures of course). I think this is an excellent series to give to a child who is not that interested in the idea of sitting down to read or write, for in it they may find the spark for their own imagination--and what could be better than that! Armchair Interviews says: Wonderful adventures set off by great illustrations make for a fun book. Fine for Middle Reader or Young Adult ages.

My two sons (6 and 5) and I have read all of Hiccup's adventures (several times each) and were eagerly awaiting this latest book. We were not disappointed in the least. Cowell's writing style draws in the reader immediately. The tales she weaves, with a great understanding of a little boy's mind, are infused with humor, danger, and intelligence. As a mom, I found that I couldn't put the books down after putting my kids to bed! All parents will appreciate that there is more depth to these stories than the upfront adventure: the underlying messages of friendship, kindness, and looking beyond appearances, are so subtly put forth, that my children, who are totally enraptured, don't even know they've been infused with quality life lessons. I couldn't recommend this and the whole series enough. I can't wait to find out what happens in the (hopefully) continuing saga.

I just finished reading this with my 5-year-old son, who, of course, LOVES dragons. We had a great time reading this together and I think I looked forward to story time almost as much as he did every night! It stayed interesting from the first page to the last, with lots of edge-of-your-seat excitement and wondering what was going to happen next. Toothless the hunting dragon is the comic relief and my son absolutely loved to hear about him and his antics. I highly recommend this book!

Wonderfully written, wonderful artwork, funny, engaging -- it has it all. My 9 y/o and I have been reading the whole series. We just wish there were more. The language can be a bit coarse for those of a tender bent (various fart references) -- but what do you think 9 y/o talk about anyway? The artwork really is pretty special and is in keeping with the author's premise of this being the reminiscences of a Viking hero. My only quibble is that the earlier books were by a different publisher and were hardbound -- which I prefer.