Beware of the Dragon's Tooth

Even though The Dragon’s Tooth, a new book by N.D. Wilson, is published by the children’s division of Random House, I am hesitant to call it a children’s book.

The book begins with the Smiths, Dan, Cyrus and Antigone, three siblings who are living in an abandoned motel named the Archer. Their father has died and their mother is in a coma in a nearby hospital.

One day, a stranger named William Skeleton arrives at the motel and demands a room for the evening. The stranger is a renegade from the Order of Brendan, a centuries-old secret society of explorers and adventurers. Skeleton has stolen from the Order a set of keys that can open any door and a dragon’s tooth, which has the power to wake hibernating immortals and also kill them.

Skeleton, a friend of the children’s parents, intends to bequeath the keys and the dragon’s tooth to the Smiths upon his death, which happens in short order. 

It seems that Dr. Phoenix, another renegade of the Order, also wants the keys and the tooth so that he can destroy the order and build a race of superior humans.

Dr. Phoenix is a hybrid of H. G. Wells’ Dr Moreaux and Robert Louis Stevenson’s Mr. Hyde. Like Wells’ Dr. Moreau, Phoenix experimentally combines humans and animals in an attempt to create the superior being.

And like Stevenson’s Mr. Hyde, Dr. Phoenix has a ghastly alter-ego named Harry Ashes that he unleashes on uncooperative victims.

Dr. Phoenix kills William Skeleton, but is unable to get the keys and the tooth because Skeleton has already given the keys and dragon’s tooth to Cyrus. To assure that Cyrus gives him the keys and dragon’s tooth. Dr. Phoenix kidnaps Cyrus’s brother and mother and holds them hostage.

To save their brother and mother Cyrus and his sister Antigone travel to Ashtown, the Order of Brendan’s compound on Lake Michigan.

Dr. Phoenix and his crew of mutants attack Ashtown in hopes of killing Cyrus and getting the keys and the Dragon’s tooth. A catastrophic battle ensues and Order of Brendan is nearly destroyed. Dr. Phoenix is almost killed, but steals a piece of the dragon’s tooth and sneaks away to further his campaign against the Order of Brendan in the next book. 

There are parts of the book I liked. The author’s attempt to create a secret society of adventurers and explorers that have influenced key events in American history is fresh and interesting, but undeveloped. Cyrus, Antigone, and the members of the Order of Brendan are genuinely and creatively written.  But they are overshadowed by a complicated plot and the overblown evilness of Dr. Phoenix.

Young teens, who liked the latter Harry Potter books and the Twilight series, may like the Dragon’s Tooth, but younger children may find the darkness of the plot and Dr. Phoenix to be overwhelming.

You can find The Dragon’s Tooth by N.D, Wilson at the Jefferson Township Public Library.