Review: Dawn of the Aspects, Part 1


Blizzard recently sent me the first part of the Dawn of the Aspects ebook which came out on February 13th. I was not sure what to expect, as I am unsure how I feel about the multi part eBook releases, and the story is one that I could imagine being done very, very wrong. There have been a lot of complaints about how the author, Richard A Knaak, has written for the Warcraft universe, and going back so far had a lot of risk that the story could be told too similarly to the previous ones he has written. Time travel would be the doom of the story in my view.

Thankfully the story did not take this route, instead going with a device that is much more plausible and less likely to force retcon on the educated reader. The book follows up on the end of the Dragon Soul raid, where the Aspects used all of their Titanic imbued power to bring down one of their own, the Old God corrupted dragon Deathwing. Now, months after those events, the former Aspects and their lieutenants are gathering at the Wyrmrest Temple for the annual Wymrest Accord, where they usually discuss the current issues plaguing the draconic races.

The newest member, Kalecgos, arrives late, and the events of the meeting go nothing like he had expected. The accord is nearly at it’s end, with the longer serving former Aspects feeling that there is no further place for the dragons in the age of mortals in Azeroth. History has shown since the defeat of Deathwing that many of the dragons have scattered, no longer feeling drawn to their common gathering places, such as the Nexus for the blue dragonflight. The age of dragons is well and truly at it’s end.

After a heart wrenching close to the gathering, Kalec travels back to the Nexus, but on his way is drawn to the bones of the Father of all Dragons, Galakrond, and some magical emanations emitting from deep within the massive bones. What Kalec finds there leads him on an exploration of the past through the eyes of Malygos, and he is drawn into the history of the Aspects before they became the leviathans that we know them as today.

It is very interesting to see Malygos, Neltharion, Alextrasza, and Ysera (we have yet to see Nozdormu) in the time before they became the dragons of today, when they were merely proto-drakes. Kalec, as written by Knaak, often echoes my own thoughts as he describes those who we later find out are the Aspects to be, which was a nice touch. When I heard about this novel, I wasn’t sure how I would feel hearing about the Aspects before they became them, and this was definitely reinforced by the novel as I was reading it.

While the events in this eBook are very early in the book, I really wanted to give my thoughts on this first part. It was tempting to not review Dawn of the Aspects until all 5 parts are out in June, but I decided it was worth a review for part 1, and suspect I will be doing the same with the other 4 parts.  It is even possible the final one will be a review of the full book, which I hope will be released as a full eBook once done.

If you are one of the folks who prefer to have the whole story, you may want to wait for the final part on June 17th, but if you don’t mind one part per month until then, definitely check out World of Warcraft: Dawn of the Aspects: Part I which is available for the Nook and Kindle devices now. Don’t forget to put your pre orders in for World of Warcraft: Dawn of the Aspects: Part II which is coming on March 18, World of Warcraft: Dawn of the Aspects: Part III on April 22, World of Warcraft: Dawn of the Aspects: Part IV on May 20, and then finally World of Warcraft: Dawn of the Aspects: Part V will be released. It may be a bit early, but I am excited to see this book, and look forward to reading it through to the end.

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