Dragons of Autumn Twilight - My First Experience with Dragonlance

Dragons of Autumn Twilight is likely the most popular piece of Dungeons & Dragons literary fiction out there, even more so than The Crystal Shard. It is a classic novel published in 1984 by TSR, written in such a way to introduce the new setting by authors Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman. In short, this story was very entertaining, and I am excited to continue. It was also very different than Realms' novels: more heroic, more catastrophic, more derivative of Tolkien, and so forth.

The book is divided into two parts called “books”. The first part introduces a group of friends coming back together after five years apart. They already all know each other except for a duo introduced early on in the tree top town of Solace.

A little slow at first, it always held promise to be an interesting story. The writing itself is good, and the worldbuilding is set up very nicely, giving us a feeling of a lost state for the world, where the gods are silent after a global catastrophe. The final chapters of part one had amazing endings where cities fell, gods spoke, and people were reborn. This was a grand journey, from point a to b to c, I was excited to dive right into the second part of the book.

The second “book” starts off similarly to the first, a sort of echo, which was fun. The story takes an interesting turn and we also get a couple more members added to the party, both of whom are awesome for different reasons. The intrigue that is introduced was also really fun to read since the limited views inside the characters’ heads made it difficult to guess. The plethora of characters makes it even tougher. That is one thing I liked, so many people in the party. I also forgot some on occasion. At its largest size the party has as many as twelve people! Fizban intrigued me the most, and Tanis was probably my favorite, along with Goldmoon.

I appreciated that the enemy was unique compared to typical D&D fare. Plus the gully dwarves were a nice and cute variation on the stout folk.

It was odd not taking many notes, and not being able to make connections to larger lore (not that it’s not there, I just don’t know it). Most of my notes were ideas for my own personal D&D campaigns. I’m also more interested now in Dragonlance as a setting than I have been before. I find the history of 300 years before the events of the book fascinating and those who know me know that I am a sucker for such lore and history: I need to learn more! I have question, the least of which is who is that old man?

After reading this, I definitely plan to read the rest of the trilogy, and likely some more Dragonlance novels, especially the ones that are in series with a Forgotten Realms novels. I also think I will share other D&D books I read, though I’m not going to read and rate all like I am for Forgotten Realms. I will keep track of this reading on the spreadsheet, so make sure to keep an eye out.

Have you read the Dragonlance books? How many have you read? 

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You can track my current progress here.