Riders of the Realm – Through the Untamed Sky

Jennifer Lynn Alvarez's Riders of the Realm Through the Untamed Sky is a winged-horse fantasy for 8 year olds about a boy who's scared of heights and a wild pegasus who never wanted a rider.

What happens

Rahkki Stormrunner would much rather be a rice farmer. Instead he's about to join his clan's flying army, because he's won Sula, the wildest winged mare anyone has seen.

Sula has her own name, Echofrost, and her own plans. Her herd crossed the ocean looking for a safe home. Now more than a hundred of them have been caught by giants and dragged away on ropes behind elephants. She needs this boy and his people to help set them free.

The chapters swap between the two of them. That's the best bit. Rahkki and Echofrost can't understand a word the other says, so you get to see each of them guessing (and often getting it wrong). She doesn't trust him. He's terrified every time she takes off. They're a very odd pair!

There's a lot going on around them too. A jungle full of dragons, a bad-tempered queen, rival riders and a princess who sneaks through secret tunnels behind the fireplaces. Rahkki is still hoping his mother, the old queen, somehow survived the night she disappeared.

Worth knowing before you hand it over

This world is tougher than most winged-horse stories. We learn early on that Rahkki's mother was assassinated by the woman who's now queen. His brother lies badly hurt after a kick from Sula, and nobody knows if he'll walk again. The clan feeds live animals to its dragon. And the ceremony that joins Rahkki and Sula ends with both of them being held down and branded with a hot iron.

It's over quickly and it isn't gory, but it's a real shock. A gentle horse lover might find it upsetting. A reader who's happy with battles, dragons and a bit of danger will probably be gripped.

It follows on from Across the Dark Water, so it's worth starting with that one if you can.

What to read next

If a boy and a huge creature learning to trust each other is what hooks them, Tomas and Ironskin is a slightly younger dragon story in the same spirit, about a blacksmith's son who ends up riding a dragon of his own.