Of the original Dragonlance trilogy, Dragons of Spring Dawning is
not my favourite. Even so, it contains some excellent moments while
serving as both a pseudo ending to the War of the Lance and a fine
introduction to the Legends series.
Perhaps it is Dragons of Spring Dawning's transitional position
that makes it impossible for it to be the best of the three. There
is a real sense in Dragons of Spring Dawning that we are not
speeding towards a resolution of the War but a shift in hostilities
from the vast and impersonal to the internal and personal. Which
means that while the book is necessary in the greater arc of the
series, it must fail to live up to the promise of its predecessors
because it cannot, by its very nature, deliver a fitting end to all
the threads of the story.
Dragons of Spring Dawning generates a feeling that Weis and Hickman
reached a point where their huge cast of characters was too much to
handle. Gilthanas and Silvara, Goldmoon and Riverwind, Alhana
Starbreeze, Lord Ariakas, Astinus, Raistlin (although that is
rectified by the Legend series), and even Fewmaster Toade get short
shrift. Their stories could have been the basis for at least two
more books in the series proper, which also would have allowed for
a stronger telling of the stories that it does manage to tell.
Of course, many of these missing stories have been told by others
in future installments of the Dragonlance universe, but one can't
help wondering how much better these stories would have been if
they'd contextualized within the War itself and told by the
originators of the series.
Regardless, the stories that Weis and Hickman do manage to tell in
Dragons of Spring Dawning are well told.
It was particularly nice to see Tanis Half-Elven through the eyes
of my four year olds, whom I read the book to.
I always hated Tanis. I found his whining insufferable; I always
felt the "supposed" darkness of his soul was a bit of a joke; I
thought his attack on Berem was too easily forgiven by his friends.
Nothing in my latest oral reading of the book has changed my mind
on any of these points. But something did change for me, and I was
finally able to see how Tanis' role as leader can gloss over his
faults for an audience as easily as it seems to for his friends in
the book. Tanis seems to have a genuine charisma. I don't get it
personally, but now at least I recognize how it works.
The entire series is worth reading multiple times, and this is an
important step along the way, but if you're anything like me don't
expect to love this episode in the Dragonlance story. It is far
from the best.