“What exactly is this place?”
“It’s the edge of the Somnium Realm, Miss Lily, between dreams and awakening. Things here haven’t yet figured out what side they’re on. . . The sky never changes in the Wilderness. It’s caught between day and night. Just like everything else that lives here.”
- Kathryn Butler, The Dragon, and the Stone
Where magical creatures roam, deceitful shrouds hide in dark corners, and where the sky is forever twilight, the Wilderness lies. Transported there by Cedric, the dragon, Lily McKinley begins an adventure unlike no other. Lily will fight to protect the most precious things in life and overcome evil.
Lily lived her life just trying to survive another day. With the burden of school, her distraught mother, and the pain of her father’s death, life was not easy for Lily.
When Lily woke up on a Tuesday morning, it was like any other. Bullies threw her books into the thick mud that surrounded the school playground, and the usual routine of keeping her tears from spilling onto the distressing pages of her science test. For Lily, it was all a typical day in her 12-year-old life.
She had trudged home, tripping on the front stairs of her tiny home, and had stumbled her way into the living room to find her grandmother parked in front of the T.V. Her mother had been sleeping, gaining what little rest she could before she left to work another night shift.
The thing was, Lily’s life had not always been as dishearting and troublesome as it was now. Once, their tiny home had rung with laughter and luscious smells had wafted out of the kitchen. No one had noticed how small the house was, because they had had each other and that was enough. To Lily, the memories seemed distant, as they had all happened before her Father had died in a car accident. Now it seemed as if there was always a dark cloud was hovering over her home and a black hole impressed into her heart.
To Lily, this was all to be expected. However, when Lily walked into her kitchen she did not expect to see a giant, scaley beast on the counter slurping soup. Lily knew she must be imagining this. Until the dragon looked straight at her.
It was this moment that changed her life. Lily is swept up into a whole other world, beginning an incredible journey. Add in castles, thrill, and an infinite imagination, and the result is a masterpiece. Will Lily protect what matters most and complete the perilous quest- alive? Who will find out, but the reader?
I loved this magical novel by Kathryn Butler! Shoutout to Crossway for sending me this fabulous story. I highly recommend this middle grade read. Kathryn Butler ties everything into a seamless story, along with the key Christian themes about learning to have faith and about sacrifice, and so much more!
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