Livi’s Library: Wings of Fire, ‘Legends Darkstalker’
The latest release in the popular ‘Wings of Fire’ series is one of the best yet
“Legends Darkstalker” standouts out in the Wings of Fire series because it elicits so many emotions and secrets, because it provides a lot of background information to the rest of the series and because it is told from the perspective of the three dynamic main characters.
November 12, 2018
Welcome to Livi’s Library, our new blog on books written by avid reader and Shield staff reporter, Olivia Watts.
Scholastic released “Legends Darkstalker,” the prequel to popular series Wings of Fire by author Tui T. Sutherland, on June 28, four years after it released “The Dragonet Prophecy,” the first book published in the series that now includes 16 published books, with the next book to be released the day after Christmas.
The series has gained popularity with both preteen and especially teen readers. The teenage fans of Wings of Fire have expressed their love of the series on and off line by making fanart of their favorite characters, writing fanfics from the perspective of characters from the series and of their own invention, and even making shirts and stickers with the characters on them. The series fits into children, teen, adventure and fantasy genres.
Each book in the series takes place from the perspective of a different character. The prologue and epilogue of each book are also from the perspective of a different character or are sometimes told in the third person. The series takes place in three arcs consisting of five books each beginning with books one through five followed by books six through ten. The third arc began this summer with book 11, “The Lost Continent,” and will continue to book 15. The 12th book, “The Hive Queen,” is set to come out Dec. 26. Scholastic will release “The Poisin Jungle,” book 13 and the third book of the third arc, on June 25, 2019.
One thing all the books have in common is that all of them are from the perspective of dragons. In the series the dragon species are separated into seven tribes that are dispersed into different regions according to their abilities across and around the continent they inhabit. The seven dragon tribes are the Icewings, Nightwings, Skywings, Rainwings, Seawings, Sandwings and Mudwings. Their continent is called Pyrrhia and is actually shaped like a dragon, which is kind of funny, and is divided into individual kingdoms amongst the dragons. The Mudwings live in the messy swamps, the Icewings in the frozen North, the Sandwings in the desert, the Rainwings in the humid rainforest, the Seawings in the deep sea, of course, and the surrounding islands, which are called “The Bay of a Thousand Scales,” the Skywings in the high mountains, and no one knows where the secretive Nightwings live.
“Legends Darkstalker” takes place 2,000 years before the beginning of the series. This may seem like too much time to be relevant, but is actually very connected to the later stories. This book is unique from the rest of the series because it takes place not just from the perspective of one dragon, but from the perspective of three excluding the prologue and epilogue. The book takes place from the perspectives of Darkstalker, Clearsight and Fathom. Darkstalker, for whom the book is named, is the main antagonist of the story and is part NightWing part Icewing. Darkstalker is extremely powerful because he can read minds and see the future and he is an animus, which means he can cast spells on objects and dragons by saying or thinking them. Clearsight is a young NightWing with the power to see the future like Darkstalker. She gained this power by hatching under a full moon. Darkstalker gained his future seeing and mind reading powers by hatching under three full moons. This is because the NightWing’s powers are directly linked to the three moons that revolve around their planet. Fathom is a SeaWing animus who is a couple years older than Darkstalker.
My favorite character is Clearsight because she’s pretty smart and very resourceful. She is always planning by looking into the future and thinking about how her and other dragon’s current decisions might affect the future. Through carefully making decisions and viewing the future, over time she learns how to avoid the terrible futures she sees and how to make the futures that are good and safe happen instead. She also tries her hardest to protect her family and friends from all harms, which is why in the book her gift is viewed as a blessing and not a curse. She uses what she was given wisely and tries her best to help others, not to get ahead or hurt other dragons.
One of the things I love the most about this series including “Darkstalker Legends” is how there are almost always multiple mysteries happening at once. This can be a bit hard to keep straight but adds to the excitement. The mysteries cause the plot to twist and turn and characters and plot points turn out to be connected in surprising ways that you never could have imagined. The whole series is full of adventure and excitement throughout and often danger.
“Legends Darkstalker” is one of the most danger-filled books in the series because it contains both animus magic and angry, scared, overprotective dragons, which is not a good combination.
“Legends Darkstalker” is one of my favorite books in this series because it contains so many emotions and secrets and because it provides a lot of background information to the rest of the series. I like that it is from the perspective of the three main characters over time because you can really see how the characters change and grow. The combination of all these elements and the dynamic characters makes this one of my favorite books that I have read, not just in this series but overall.
Alk • Jun 28, 2023 at 10:43 am
why did Darkstalker become evil and lie to Moon??